00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan, and this is episode number two three, and today in the show, we're joined again by Dan in Fault to take a deeper than ever look into his hunting Beast style strategies and philosophies for public land and heavily pressured white tail bucks. All right, welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Onyx. And today on the show, we have Dan in Fault back with us on the podcast for the first time since two thousand fourteen. And if you're not familiar with Dan, I hope this helps change that because Dan is one of the I think it's fair to say he is one of the most revered and respected serious d I Y deer hunters out there, and he's become well known because of this forum he started called The Hunting Beast, and then many different DVDs, books, and other resources that he's put out over over past years to help people learn about his aggressive and mobile style of deer hunting that seems to work particularly well for people that are hunting public land or heavily pressure private lands. And you know, Dan was actually one of our very first guests on the show. I think he was on our very third episode, definitely one of our most popular guests, So I knew that we had to get him back on eventually. But over the course of this four year period since then, you know, Dan has been featured in a lot of different outlets, websites, YouTube channels, podcasts, let alone his own website and all the different things that he's doing there. So my thing was that if if we're gonna have Dan back on again, we just had to find a way to make sure it wasn't, you know, just another rehash of what's already been done on all these other podcasts and shows out there that have popped up since we first started doing this. So here's my idea. To get the next level conversation with Dan. I decided to bring on a couple of guest co hosts who could dive deeper with Dan than even I could. These two guys have studied under Dan for years and years. They've been longtime members of his Hunting Beast forum. They understand Dan's hunting philosophy, is probably better than most anyone else. They've tested his ideas for themselves in the field, and they're now some of the very most successful d I Y deer hunters out there themselves too. I wanted these guys to ask the questions to Dan that they've always wanted answered. So here to do that with me are two of my good buddies and past guests on the podcast as well, Andy May and Joe Elsinger. And that's the game plan. Joe, Andy and myself are going to ask all sorts of questions of Dan in an attempt to you know, anything, and tempt to explore ideas and maybe lessons learns and tactics that Dan hasn't shared as much about in the past. So the format does end up being a little bit more like a Q and A and not as much of a cohesive examination of a single topic like we sometimes do. So kind of all over the place, but I think you'll find we cover some really interesting things that should help a lot of you out. And I should note you know, if you haven't heard our first two episodes with Dan, you probably should go back and listen to those first, so you kind of have the proper foundation to understand what we cover today because we don't cover a lot of the basic elements of Dan's hunting tactics or his his kind of style of hunting. We don't cover much of that, So you'll want to listen to those first episodes to get that background necessary and then come back to this one to kind of cover that that next level stuff. I think even even if you did listen to those first couple episodes way back in two thousand and fourteen, you might even still want to review the now just what's fresh in your mind. So with that being the case, I do think you're all going to come away from this one with a lot of great new ideas. I'm exed I for you to listen to it. I'm excited to listen to it again myself and try to think through some of these things and how they might be applied to my own hunting season. So that's what we have in store for you today. But before we get to the main event, we do need to pause briefly to thank our partners at Onyx for the support of this podcast. And you know, Onyx is the maker of the Onyx Hunt app which is, at least from what I've seen the most useful digital mapping app out there for hunters, and it includes all of your typical GPS app type features. It has all sorts of different types of layers that are useful to a deer hunter, like satellite imagery, topo lines, property borders, public land information. But what I've found particularly useful with the app just recently is that it also includes some information that can help you out if you are hiking or camping. You know, I've been out here in Montana for the last couple of weeks and I've actually been using my onyx app to show me where National forest borders are, which helps me determine where I can pull off and camp for free. And the app also shows many different hiking trails and trail heads and even designated campgrounds. So this has been really helpful for me as we've been driving out in the middle of nowhere, Montana and trying to figure out where we're gonna stay at night, where we're gonna head to, what types of places you want to stay at. It's been very handy for that, and of course I think this would be very useful for anyone planning a back country elk or mule deer hunt too. So as always, I'm finding on x to be a great tool, and if you'd like to learn more about it yourself, you can visit onyx maps dot com or search for onyx that's O n X on your phone's app store. And now let's get to the show with Joe, Andy and Dan. All Right, I've now have with me three more folks I've got as my co host join me today, Joel Eli Singer and Andy May. And joining us as our actual guest though, is Dan in Fall. So welcome back to the show. Dan. It's been a little while. Yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah, I think it was way back in two thousand fourteen when we actually were able to do this last that's kind of time flies. I can't believe it's been that long, but we had you on twice and those are great episodes. Um, But since then, I think a lot has changed, most notably at least from your end. I think, you know, I think more and more people have found out about what you're doing in your style of hunting, whether it be just from engaging with your own website and your forum and your podcasts and videos, or from the other appearances you've made on gosh, the the two thousand other podcasts that have popped up now across the world. So you've been you've been kind of sharing your your methodology all over the place. A lot of people are interested and excited about it. So so when I got to thinking, I was like, I want to have Dan back on the show, but how do we do something that's different? How do we do something that's kind of next level? And Um, the idea I had was to bring Joe and Andy on as co host because I think it's fair to say, um, and you guys jump in if you if you want to correct me here, but I think I would look at them as kind of proteges of yours and that they've they've been following what we've been doing on the Hunting Beast. They've been longtime members your forum and some of the very most successful guys on there, and now they've kind of gone out and they've been able to develop their own styles and they've they've been sharing that with the world too. So I think they've got an interesting perspective as they've learned a ton of from you but then grown in their own way. UM. So my hope here is that in addition to my own curiosities, I think these two guys are gonna have a lot of questions for you that are going to be maybe even more in depth or more interesting than anything I have, since they're head and shoulders above me, even when it comes to understanding what you do and or how to apply that kind of stuff out there um in the field. So that's kind of my my idea for this this chat. And I guess to start though, Dan, if you're if you're up for this, most people know what you're up to. But if there's someone new listening right now, if we just want to establish like a little bit of of a foundation, even if someone came up to you and was just like, you know, Dan, what is beast style hunting? And a lot of people call it this now, they call it beast style hunting. If you had to give them like a cliff notes answer to explain, like your general style of hunting, how would you how would you do that? Dan Um? Probably I would say it's, uh, it's a style of getting really close to the book betting and really understanding book betting and uh getting the worth of deer moving daylight and so so then if that's the case of its betting focused. How is your hunting style different now than it was when we talked back then? Have have have you evolved at all or has your style changed at all in the last three or four years? Not much. Um, I've been involved in my whole life, so I think that the last few years have been pretty flatlined as far as development and real quick I have a quick question on that. How about your focus as a hunter, because I feel like I think, I mean, no, you might know what you're where, you're going there, but I feel like you're focused maybe has changed and if you yeah, that that is correct. Um, Joe makes a good point there. Um, I think my focus is uh, it's really changed. And uh, I'm not aggressive as a hunter and I don't care as much anymore if I'm successful, and I'm worry more about others than I do myself. I think when I was younger, that drive and stuff is what put a lot of those giant bucks on my wall. And you know what they hate you lose a little bit of that drive. Uh. And I kill a lot more bucks now out of knowledge. When I was younger, I think I kill a lot of them out of just sheer determination, What will this dan when it comes to those that's that sheer determination everything? Have you seen the outside world change at all? Enforced you change? And I guess something I feel like has been happening is with the kind the word out about how you hunt and other public land and kind of heavily pressured area hunters out there. There's a lot of people talking about this kind of stuff. Now, I feel like more and more guys are getting the confidence to go and hunt public places and go in these tough hunt places and dive in there and do this kind of stuff. Have you seen like increased pressure? Like are there more people trying to do the same things that you've been doing? Is that making things more difficult for you? Yeah, it's it's really been a huge change the last couple of years. It's really starting to grow rapidly. And uh it's interesting, you know. Um, I'm seeing guys that you know, you used to say you never go in your betting changing your whole tune now and uh a lot of mainstream guys adapting the same philosophies. Um, so I think it is growing, um really big. Um. It gets kind of hard for me because um, I like to talk you know, like more like with the Joe's and Andy's out there who are really hardcore and uh and uh I can relate with and and but I got a lot of new new people coming to me all the time, asking the same questions over and over and over again. I find the bad dad. We all start there, you know. That's the thing, and and one of the one of many things I admire about you, Dan, and I for the record, you've taught me, you know, on the East in general has taught me more about hunting than any other one entity in my entire lifetime. You know, you're willing to answer those questions begin and again because we all start there. And you know, you know, it's like a you know, answering a three year old when it comes to how to you know, put on their codes in the morning. But we all start there, and you remember that it's really easy to become almost arrogant. Either's examples out there, you know, people's ignoring others. Um and you're always going to teach. So I don't know one question I had for you regarding that, where do you Where did that come from? I guess you know, I, um, where does that desire to you? Know, to help others out, even even to your detriment. You know, we've talked about that where you know, you know you're getting more pressure in areas that you hunt. I know I'm feeling it too, um, but we still do it, you know, because it's in the big picture that's a good thing. I guess. You know. Even when I was younger, I think I worried more about that stuff, and you know, it gives making an impact on me. I had a, um two seasons ago, I had a really large non typical alis hunting and some people that follow me figured out my where I was hunting that deer and really moved in and took over and they ended up killing it. And uh, that stuff happens. But I don't really mind that much anymore. Um. But what I really like to do is is I hate the direction that the hunting industry is going. And it's almost going to like a you've gotta have certain products and you have to be uh like a deer farmer type guy. And the people out there don't have the money or the the ability to get on good private land and hunt away. All these other people are hunting and they've just kind of lost souls, And I think what I'd like to see is the woodsmanship. I saw when I was young that the old hunters had come back, and uh, it's almost a lost art. And I think kind of, you know, you're talking about be style. I think a lot of that is the woodsmanship, learning what dear do, how they behave and stuff, rather than just um, you know, planting a food plot or putting on a pile of food. Not that there's anything wrong with that, just I'd like to see people, you know, at least adapt and understand the skills of the woods like they used to. Yeah, hey, Dan, this is the indie that kind of sparks a question that I had. Uh, kind of piggyback off that. But you think that kind of that focus on big buck or the big buck craze that kind of seems to be compounding itself and getting you know, such an emphasis on that. Do you do you feel like that's kind of ruining hunting in a way in your opinion to some degree. But you know, I think that's what drives a lot of people who get out there, as long as they don't let it consume them. I think it's good, you know, it could kind of consume me when I was younger. Um, but I think, you know, I don't see it's bad in a lot of this new generation. I think I think people do have a team down a bit more than the older issue come come down a little a little bit from you know, ten twenty years ago, it seemed a peak and you know that's all everybody thought about, right, I have seen like a little more especially it kind of it seems like you know what, um, you know, some of the public land issues and you know the threats on public land there there has been a slight switch to uh, you know, just more about the journey and more about the hunt and more about the experience. Um. You know, I have I have seen that focus and that emphasis so that I actually really like. So that's kind of that's good. You know, some of the things Dan said kind of making me think about some of these other questions that I've kind of always wanted to ask him. And this is one that you actually answered on a recent podcast, but maybe you could even take it a little bit further. But um, you know, you've been pretty open about you know, when you were younger and you've had young kids that you know, your your commitment to hunting was on such a high level that you even miss some you know, important things that involved your family. And you know, I can tell you know by bringing that up you have some regret there. Um. But at the same time, you know, you mentioned that you wouldn't really change much. But what would you what would you give for advice to like kind of aspiring young hunters that you have families like young families at home as far as like a time commitment. Um. And then in addition to that, um, you know, what would you if they kind of wanted to find that balance? How do you or what would you tell them if if they wanted to kind of maximize their success on mature dear, I think what I'd see is a lot of the people that have a problem making that balance really uh put deer over everything, and uh what they got to realize is that, um, if you shoot, you know, even you Andy, I don't remember what you shot last year, but I really look up to you. Do you remember what I shot? You don't. I don't think anybody really cares what any of us shot. Really, So if you put another buck in the wall or you don't, I don't think it's a big deal and to sacrifice your family and your kids and birthdays and that kind of thing. Um, Like you said, I took it to the extreme and I regret a little bit of it. But yeah, that's what made me who I am, you know. But I think I would I would tell those kids that it really doesn't matter if they put a buck in the wall or not, you know that, to put their ethics and morals and stuff first, and uh be able to look at the deer that they get that they earn, you know, um, with respect and respect and pride. I'm curious Andy, Andy and Joe to you guys over there about you, how how do you guys look at balancing hunting and family obligations and stuff like that. Andy, do you have any thoughts on that? Because I know you've got you have a family yourself. How how's that been for you? And then Joe would be creous for you're jumping after that? Yeah, Um, I think I was um a lot like Dan before I had kids. I was I don't know if i'd say lucky, but my situation. I ended up having kids a little bit later than say most of my friends. Um, you know, I was thirty two years old when I had my first, um thirty one, so you know, literally from I started. I started hunting late in my life too, so I was right around the seventeen. But from seventeen to thirty one, UM, that's all I did. You know, I literally scouted five or six days a week, um, completely obsessed with it and hunt it, you know, as often as possible, nearly every day of the season. Um. And then once the once the child came, UM, I toned it back um substantially. But you know, it was that it was those early years I've mentioned that before, that kind of time commitment, UM, that really kind of set the foundation of of my learning. I'd like to think that I'm still evolving, and I I feel like I am, but just probably at a slower pace than what I was at that time because I just I literally that's what I That's just what I did. I literally stopped every other hobby and passion of mine and it was just hyper focused on big deer and hunting. UM. But then you know, toned it back and now I just try to try to keep a balance. I don't want to miss anything with the the kids, and UM, you know, I just wouldn't really feel right about that, And I don't know, I looked at when Dan kind of opened up about that. I remember seeing a threat about it a few years years ago, and I just thought that those were really wise words, you know that you know, you don't let it consume you, and there's there's other things that are more important, and there's nobody's really going to care what you you killed at the end of the day. You know, at the end of your life, no one's gonna care what your wall looks like or how many big bucks you have on it. So I try to keep that in perspective now and just really focus on that that family time. But when it's time to scout and time to hunt, you know, it's a hundercent commitment during that time frame. Yeah, I had a similar journey, you know, other than I, you know, grew up hunting and uh, I spent a hundred and ten percent of my time, um, you know, uh hunting all through my teens and early twenties. And it just slowly how much time I've been able to spend and slowly with each days in my life and kids being kind of most recent days because I had kids like to Hucky and b I I've got three your in the five year old right now. It so not that long a thirties, so um yeah, you know, school and having a career and you know now I've got a managerial position at work and every everything just knocked a few more hours off it, um, which it's unfortunate. And uh, you know, yeah the fire still burns. That's for shared, for getting out there, but it's not you know, it's it's a matter of priorities and life's what you make of it. You only get one life, so that's that's all I look at it, and that I agree, like the only keep told that really care what they shoot. You know, it's the face in the mirror. And a lot of times I think other people, you know a lot of people build it up way too much. And there's you know, people out there in the industry that I think it's kind of unfortunate. You know, it's all or nothing, and it seems like, you know, there's no mention of family or they were married, you know, it fell apart because they put that ahead of everything else, and I think that really unfortunate. Yeah, my son right now, you know, you've asking to take him deer hunting. This fall and I'm going to you know that that that and I kind of shoot a big buck doing it. No, and you know, hopefully with the good deer. Uh. And but that I wouldn't have it any other way. When you have somebody, you know, kid asking it that, that's just magical. Yeah, I know this this whole idea, like you know, taking better advantage of the of the time that you do have and being a little more efficient with it. I know that's something you've talked about, Andy, because not only do you have like the family obligations, but also your job doesn't like you get away for really big long stretches of time. Um so so to you Dan. Then for someone who's in a situation kind of like this where they're trying to balance family and work and hunting and they're just trying to become a more efficient hunter and use the time they do have more effectively, you know what what kind of things would you offer now is you've been able to kind of go through that transition yourself to becoming more efficient with that time. Yeah, it's hard if you don't If you don't hunt a lot, you don't hear it from a lot of guys who hunt weekends, and so much changes in the woods and the patterns changed so much in a week that it's hard to keep up if you're not out there a lot. I still hunt, you know, four or five times a week, but to me, that's a lot less than I used to. Uh, you know, I think one of the big things is to not overlook the properties near your house. I kill a lot of big bucks on property that's really over pressured. That's convenient because I don't have two hours to go run to the great property, but I got, you know, thirty minutes after work to run down the street and hunt the public swamp where everybody else's h So, you know, just learning that property and getting out and getting chances because I have more time to hunt that. I kill a lot of bucks in hard situations just because I'm out there, you know, And and I push it. So I think, uh, you know, to find stuff near your home, near your work, like where you can get out of work and go straight out on a day that maybe your family's off doing something or whatever. You can get out more that way on page you normally wouldn't. I think that helps a lot. And Andy, would you add anything since I've mentioned that you're kind of in that spot a little bit too. Yeah. No, that's uh, that's exactly what I do. Dan. We've got some stuff close to home and work that it certainly isn't what I would consider good quality, but I know it intimately. And um, you know, when a big buck shows up, which isn't all that often, but you know, when they do, they're you know, you usually have a pretty good idea on how to hunt them and a good chance of getting him. But other than that, I would just say, you know, just really you know, when you when you kind of settle it in some areas, UM, if you can't put a lot of time in hunting, make sure you put in as much time at possible scouting. Um. And I know Dan believes in this too, but uh, you know I scout way more than the actual hunts that I get, So I try to intimately learn the areas, uh to the point where I just they're almost they almost feel like home to me. You know. If there's um, you know, there's I know every betting area, and I know every water source and um, every fruit bearing tree and you know, just kind of all that kind of stuff, and then you know, build on that with hunting experiences and keep notes. Um you know, uh, you know, tendencies and times of year when things seem to be better, and just kind of accumulate all that and that you can really kind of increase your efficiency with uh you know, with that knowledge. You bring up a really good point because knowing that knowing the area intimately is really important because if you don't scout in the onetime, if you don't take that time, you get to really learn that prob pretty and you're going out to trying to figure it out. I mean, good luck. When you're on ten days a year or twenty days a year, you're gonna you're gonna struggle. Um, Like Andy says, I mean, I go into a three thousand acre property behind my house here, I know where every bedtonary is. So if once there, I know where he's gonna be. So as I have to find sign up a buck and go okay, he's in one of these you know, three or four bettering areas and then hunt him down. Um. But if you can't, if you because you're time's limited, don't scout in spring and don't scout during the season, you're in for a long, hard hunt. That's a lot of guys think they find a vetinary or something too, and then they bank on it. You know. You see a lot of these new guys get really excited when they find a good bedtry. And I think Andy joking, I relate to this. You find some of these vetinaries and they look so tore up, you think, oh, this is golden Well. I can tell you from experience. I've hunted like twenty of those last year and I ended up coming out of it without a buck last year. You know, on the question, I wanted to, Uh, they somebody is really limited at your time. They get two weeks to vocation that's been hot. How would you split at the tweet and scouting and highing like you got? Um, you know, that's a good question. I mean I would definitely want to get some spring scouting and but you think you could get some of that done on the weekends. Um, But if that's all I had was two weeks period for the whole year, I think it would go into scouting. Yeah, but you know, I go I go on trips a lot and go to new areas and and I always like hunting spots I've never been, and I think it's kind of exciting to go in and learn something, to figure it out. And when I go to those new properties, I usually don't hunt mornings and I scout my whole day and then I'm hunting in a spot that I scouted that day whatever was best, And that way I'm not you know, I don't wait till deer walk through and smells I've been there. But I'm going to the outskirts of what looks like betting to me. That's been real good to me going in hunting in that manner scout hunting, you know, can can you elaborate on what that actually looks like? Then during that that new property process, what's the actual scouting process during that period when you're actually gonna go hunt that day, Well, I'm trying to figure out what I think is betting. I mean a little. It's gonna be looking at maps, um you know, aerials, um if it's swamp or flat ground and you know on the top as if it's hilly or both, and uh, then I'm gonna go out and actually look and see what's got the cover that all old deer and such. And then I'm not going to go to where I think the betting is, but I'm gonna go to where you know, I'm gonna kind of circle it the seefter scoop sign coming in and out and then try to get as close fall and that sign as I can and uh set up on it. Yeah. I saw I saw a video that you and Mario did where you guys were reviewing your two thousand seventeen season, and you talked about this kind of grid style approach to hunting a new property where you wrote the property down in two sections and then worked your way through them. Can you can you talk about that a little bit? Uh, that that particular style of hunting originated uh way back when I sudden the property and there was a really nice buck on that property for that time frame, and I was on all the key spot that had always produced and never seen this book. But he's showing up on cameras and the you know, in the fielding areas or mass trees um right after dark. So I knew he was in there, but I couldn't figure out where he was. And I knew if it wasn't seen him, wasn't see him in daylight. And I took that property and and I broke it down into like ten acre squares, and I just I was gonna hunt every square until I got through the property. And I got towards the hand and I and one of the spots that was up to hunt. It was just an open wood lot, and that thought, where are the odds? But I'm gonna give a shot. And I went in there in that book, got up from behind some brush the transition and came to me and I shot it just out of the blue. I didn't know he was there or anything else, and went over there. There's just a beat bet there that I would never found because I would never thought he betted there. So then I started to figure out that you know, sometimes you just can't see it. And if you break that property down and grid it like that and go in and force yourself to hunt a new section each time, um, you can find those bucks that are on that property pretty quick. Do you think I'm waiting for that that buck to come to you? You're going to him. And then by doing the tenant or um area and in the best spot, even if he's not in the best spot, you're probably gonna see your hearer sent them if you're in that area and he's in it. Yeah, so so when is that kind of approach better than the approach that you mentioned before where you scout during the day for specific sign looking for a certain things. You saw a map and then hunted that or do those two things go hand in hand sometimes? Well they can, they kind of go hand and in but you know, I think my first approach is to go in there and scout those transitions, find the sign hummed on like like I said earlier. But sometimes I struggled with a certain book after a certain animal, and I can't get them through those traditional memes um traditional to me anyways, And that's when I and I decide where I'm going and I'm finding them, um, you know, I'm just hunting them down basically. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense, all right, Andy? What else is on your man? Uh? I wanted to touch on some more some more bedding stuff. Um. You know you've talked a lot about, um, like any wind beds, you know, beds that are used in type of any type of wind direction and that wind based beds. Can you kind of explain um, like the differences um that you see in regards to like terrain or examples of where you might find each you know, where they where they might be the most common. And how you are what which one do you think are the most effective to target? Uh, I don't I don't know about one being more effective than the other to target. But UM, the eating wind beds are usually the easiest to hunt because you can get the closest because it's UM. They're usually not site based UM. But you can tell the difference between these beds. I think it's a good topic because we haven't really talked about this a lot in like podcasts or anything. But when you look at a buck bed, it's different than a dough bed because the dose like bed net circle that open area. A buck puts his puts himself, you know, in cover, and he's worried about himself. So when you look at that bed, you're thinking, you know, um, this animal is here so that you can't get near him instead of working as that group. And if you've got a buck who puts his back up against something and he's got an open view the other way, I guarantee that winds coming from the obstacle and he's looking down winding it open. So you can see those UM wind based betting by looking for the opening. You know, if you look in hill countries really, um the big one for for that wind based And if you look at those beds, you can you can see how they put themselves up against a tree or behind the tree, and they looked down the hill, you know, with the wind to the back. Um, you see the same thing. And you know, like a farm country, they'll get up on the edge of a field in bed you know, just ten twenty ft into the cover, but where they can kind of see out into the field or see down a lane into that field. Uh, they'll have that wind to their back. So they're on those um those tree lines looking at the field with the wind to the back. And you know, just a guy that hunts farm if he if he knows that much, he doesn't have to hunt the way the wind hunt. But if you know those box are going to bed on the side that's got the wind coming out of the woods, he does not have to walk into their to their eyesight, you know what I mean. Yeah, on the topic of terrain, do you see any wind beds uh that you know, beds with any wind you uh more common contest on this, but you seem more common in third terrain like swamps. Yeah, swamps and marshes have more the wind based and non won based beds are in every train, but the majority of non wind beds that are good for big bucks are in marshes and swamps, or the majority of wind based beds are in hill country, more foreign country and edges. How about when you find beds down low wind hill country? Do you find those to be more often? Win any wind? That? Where do you find them to be more commonly? I know, usually it depends on the cover. If they're in heavy grass heavy brush, UM, and they don't have a good view, then they're usually any wind. If they're betting on edge looking towards old with thick the back or something to the back, then there in the wind based and you have to go out there just look at it. I mean those low areas, you know, it's all hard to set up. Yeah, that's that's something I've just wondered. Uh, when occasionally I run into deer downlow in the hills, UM less likely to be associated when you're not. It's a big one in U In big woods too, you got where you have those old clear cuts that grow thick. Those big box are usually on the down wind edge to the open woods and they'll look into the open woods from the edge of that where guys think that they're in the middle of that thick area, they're usually not. So you're saying that there they've got the wind blowing from the thick behind their back and they're watching the open woods in front of them right right, and some steps into that open woods, they just slide into the thick. If they smell something or here's something in that thick coming at them, they go out. And then they also, like on that big woods, if there's a terrain feature along that edge is not just a straight long like just one spot where they got a little point of the thick stuff going out, they'll get on on that point so they can see all the way around the point and smell from behind, just like in Hill Country, only it's flat. Yeah. Yeah, So speaking of these different types of betting areas, right in past episodes we've done with you, and then on your past DVD s you've had the Hill Country DVD is talking a lot about the different types of betting situations. There. You've got the Martian Swamp betting areas that we've talked about a lot in the past. We've got a new DVD coming out about farmland hunting. Um, can you talk specifically about that? What types of things? And you alluded to a few things already, but is there anything else when it comes to hunting farmland as far as how you think about their betting, how you hunt to that related to that betting in this specific farm situations. Sure, and I'll give you my taking. I'd like to hear handies on it because I don't know any scott little experience there um and Joe Joe comes from farm farm area to um. But one of the big things I think people misunderstandable farm country is I've learned a lot of it, and it's pretty rare. I find a big buck in the big wood lot in the middle of the farm. The big box usually are on the tree lines. I'm a little brush off to the side. They're out in more of the open areas, in the thick spot that's being overlooked. It's not too often I see him in that big block. If I do seem in that big block, it's that downwind side on the downwind end of that block. So as you see, yeah, I do see that quite a bit. Um. It's like where I hunt uh in Michigan. I'd say it's a pretty good mix of timber and farm land. We do got quite a bit of cover and there's you know, you got your marshes and your slamp stuff. But when I where I'm in uh northern Ohio is like craft fields with little tiny woodlots, and they bed uh exactly how Dan says. Um. You know usually if they if they are in them, um a wood lot, they'll they'll bed right on the edge kind of facing the open ground. Um. And for a lot of years, UM, I would get busted because that's you kind of put the wind in your face and you kind of try to sneak into this little wood lot you know that you think are holding all this deer and there you know, the what I would find after scouting is there be beds right just inside the wood lot, you know before right on the edge of where it kind of you start to get some um some understory of facing the field that I was actually accessing from. And then I also find them in like the edges of hedgerows, like right right at the chip, or like the little drainage um, you know, the little drainage ditches. You know, a whole a little bit of water. They'll be like little curves or little angles and those, and there'll be beds there where, you know, maybe the the combine can't quite hit, you know, right on the edge, so you get these little pockets the cover and what's that doesn't need to be true. They don't need to be true either mentioned that. No, no, not right, not at all. Right, But you watch all the honors go straight with lives. You know. Another thing I've noticed on those farms too, is when they have one access and those hunter is always parking the same spot. I mean, the biggest stuff I find is usually set up to watch that access. How long do you think that takes for local bucks to kind of figure that out and start adjusting their betting to watch that? Is that something that can happen like right now? I don't know now long it takes. Um so the time when I run into it, it's it's already been a prolonged thing, you know. Um. I can't think of any place where I'm the one who started hunting their first on the farm. Most of the farms I've been on her shared access. But I go scout properties a lot for people. And that's one thing I look for right away is those bucks that are in that little forgotten spot watching their access and that's usually where I find the biggest stuns. Joe, you didn't get to share your thoughts on on your farm country bedding observations. What would you say there? Yeah, I agree entirely. Sam hunt everything from like ten or cover up to Iowa. So, um, you know, in the areas where covered limited. For one, there's a huge change when the crops come out. I would point out that, and everybody kind of knows that. But you go from a hundred percent cover down to ten you know, um when the corn is picked. But still those small areas, you know, if the grahasses, you know, eight tall, you might find a deer bed in there, and might find a pick buck beded in there, you know, and especially the higher the pressure is, the less likely they are going to bed anywhere there's trees, you know, it's a little you'll find a beded on graph terraces and then you know, drainage sales if the graphs is a tall enough couple weeds or whatever. Um on the ends of Little Senior September far more like Pla. Then the larger degree and another question for dan Um, how do you see frequency of using beds change and farm country do you see for you know, my observation is there seems to be more satellite beds less you know, heavily used primary beds. Bucks might be a little more nomadic. I am not saying they don't have core its and core betting areas. They definitely do, but I'm just curious what your observation has been. I see a lot of core bed and areas, just like I doing other trains. Um, it's a little more nomadic, like you said, but what I see is they don't wear those beds in because they shift around a lot. I think they shift around a lot, and based on the exact wind um. For example, there's a little farmed on the street that I lunched over here my buddy Dave bones. It gets heavy pressure all the way around it, but there's one spot where the bucks that we've killed there come out of. It's obviously the primary betting and no matter what time of the year when we see bucks, that's generally where he come out at of the time. And you go in here and for some of it doesn't have an eye for it, you'd have a hard time seeing those beds and the area is probably in two acres in size, and it's a low density area, but you'd have a hard time notice in those beds. I mean you going there in the snow, you find them because you see exactly where they laid. But I think they're moving a lot based on you know, the thermal and the wind and stuff. I don't think you're in the same bed all day. You know where if you get into steep hill country, you find those warm beds and you think you've gotta made when it might not be used anymore than the ones in farm country. Is just that explaining in that exact same spot because of the wind and thermal need at that spot all day long, So he's not shifting around. Um So I think a lot of times it just looks like it's not being used as much. But I do see in farm country it's a lot harder to see the bedding areas, or in any black ground for that matter, unless it's like swamp or cattails, then you see it better. But any flagground, like like big woods or farm country, it's really hard to find those worn in bits. Yeah, that's that's that's interesting to say that because I hunted a farm once. I don't hunt anymore, but for a number of years it was like a two hundred acre farm and maybe eating fifteen acres a cover total. And of the box that I all the bucks that I saw at least three years of old age. They came out of the top of a skinny draw that was there was at an old farm pond there. Damn had washed out so they retained water anymore. And I grew up in brush, although deer betted on the peril, you know, on the whold banks of that pond, depending on the wind direction, and it was only you know, maybe an acre in size, and every stinking decent bucks that I saw on that two hundred acres came out of that location. It was always amazing, and you couldn't help find bet there. There was a bunch of real life to youth bed but you add up all the real life bets and there was a lot of youth. Is there is there anything specific, Dan that you were that that helps you or someone if someone's listening who doesn't have the eye for when they're looking for these beds in the farm country, that it's not quite as obvious as there might be in hill countries, anything they can be looking for to help find those hard to find spots, you know, the biggest thing in hill country, and it's hard to get the serve of guys that don't have a lot of hunting time. But it's observation. Um, I don't hunt as much as I observe and farm. I'll sit back and watch and the deer get more used to coming out earlier, and you see what's going on, and you're not damaging the property by jumping in here and spooking everything out. You see what's going on. So you know, you're watching area expecting the bok to come out, and all of a sudden you see him from out somewhere's else and now you're like, oh, if I would have went in her, how to spook them? But in foreign country, I think a lot of it's observing and it's uh, you know, watching from a distance and then moving in with us to right. And that's an too because I think, uh, you know, when I actually see a buck make a move and I make a move on him, I think it's a one in four chance I get an opportunity at him by moving in the next day, But it wasn't four odds ain't bad. Yeah, that's that's a good thing. That example that I talked about earlier, that is, you know that that far the oldly reason like that was good ten years ago, and I didn't really have a very good understanding of betting whatsoever. The only reason I knew was a betting area was watching the deer come out of it, because I was set up in other places, and I'll shoot the buck came out of that. I might not be real fast owner, but that's very It's all that a time or two, you know, it was clearly there bet in there nowhere else. I gotta follow up question for dan Um kind of in regards to the farm betting Um. One of the things I struggle with and like my more open areas, I guess is you know, for instance, there's this one piece, uh well, there's a couple of pieces I'm thinking about, but one in general is has very little has a real tiny wood lot, and you know, the big bucks don't really bed in there at all. But it's got some hedgerows coming off and a little drainage dish that comes off that's has real tall, kind of overgrown grass along it, and if you walk the whole piece, you walked every edge, you'll find I don't know, maybe six buck beds, and you know, I have my my thoughts on which ones are the best because they're the most worn and and just kind of make the most sense. But then there, you know, all these other ones that you might call satellite beds or they're less used. Do you what what do you do with those? Because I find like more times than not, like okay, I glass a buck, or I get a picture of a book on this property, I'm like, okay, you know, here's the wind, this is where I think he's gonna be, and you know, I'm speaking into that bed, and it seems like more times than not, I get busted by a deer that's in one of these satellite beds that I kind of help, um, you know, at a lower value, but they're still getting used. I mean, do you systematically kind of hunt those as well, or do you go right or the one that you know? I don't. I don't want the satellite, but if I know it's satellite betting and there's smaller books being in those spots, I don't worry about them. I try not to spook them. If there's a way I can get into without spooking, I do it. But if I have to spook, my spook them. And one thing I do is I go in early. Um. I think if you spook younger deer early in today the book is less likely to get up and run off. If it's more towards the evening, when he's more alert and getting up anyways, I think he's more likely to get the bust out of there. And uh, there's some credits to that in my observations too, So I think that's working. Um. But I've kicked up plenty of deer where they've ran right through the bed arry and you think, damn it, you know, and I set up anyways, and I've had the big buck get up right where that bucket run through and come to me. But I've also had times when you I've seen them run through there in the in the big buck get up and run with them. So it's not what you want to do, um, but you might have to. You don't kick a deer or two to get in there. It's just part of it. Mm hmmm. Um. I want to get your opinion on this too. So I founded both and I've seen some pretty significant differences between the two, but really high deer density areas versus really low deer density areas. So my open area that I hunt is really low, low deer density, UM, not much cover for deer, very low numbers. You'll get skunks nine out of ten times. But when you do see a you know, a buckets typically a good one. But what I what I see is as much later movement. I'm talking about outside the rut here. So let's talk about like, you know, kind of early season through mid October, but I see much later movement, um, you know, with the lower deer density. UM. Kind of really okay, you're seeing the higher density, and I was like, I'm seeing the opposite. I'm seeing the same thing you're seeing. Okay, yeah, and the high deer density is what I'm seeing is much earlier movement, even by the mature deer. But what it makes it this cult is all the influx of other deer that are moving by you or past you, are all around you, and then it's like you spook one of them. It's like a domino effect, you know, and it just kind of sets and it just kind of sets them all off, and they all end up running back. So I find difficulty in both situations. But is that kind of like what you see too? Yeah, I see that a lot too. Uh, I do see that like Uh. I think it's maybe the younger deer getting moving around to get the bigger books up with the higher density. Even outside of the road, you seem to get the bigger buck movement earlier. Um. Yeah. And for me, I think if I think back my my younger days, I had a lot of problems with those deer coming and spooking um, the early arrivals and spooking the buck on me. It doesn't happen as much anymore. And I think it's because I'm setting up better and wiser and h taking into effect. You know, when I go in an area and I look to set up, I'm really easing in there. And most of the time I don't have a set tree. You know, there's a there's some occasions where there's one tree you gotta be and we all know that. WHI there's a lot of places where there's several trees you'd be in and I'm basing it on that the exact wind that day, or you know, or where I think the thermal is gonna pull or that kind of thing something without walking on the trails and stuff, and I get busted a lot less by those uh other deer coming through. It still happens, and uh sometimes it's just down right hard to get in without spooking the younger deer. But on the other hand, even the spots that are really difficult, I think if you're after a certain animal, I think you've gotta go and hunt those spots or that big buckle just smull up in there and you'll never go you know what I mean, You have to you have to throw all stand up. I heard you talk in in in some review video I think maybe was that same video I mentioned earlier you were talking about how, at least in this situation you were mentioning how you don't like to do the systematic you know, okay hunting here today and then get a little bit closer the next time, a little bit closer, the next time, a little bit closer the next time. You mentioned how you prefer to either observe from far back or just go right right for the kill. Um, is that is that right? And then can you can you elaborate on that a little bit? I think that's to relate to what we're talking about here a little bit. Yeah, I I totally agree with that. UM. I think if you kind of um uh as people say, hunt your way in. UM. If you if you do that on a buck bed and you you know, you spot and then you move up a hundred yards or something, it's like to me part of my friends was slapping him on the ass and saying, game on. You know, you tell them you're hunting them. UM. I used the term hunt my way in. I probably should refrain from saying in that, but I'm certain areas that are narrow sometimes I hunt my way in, but I'm hunt a different binary every day. You know what I mean? To hunt warm bedinry and to ease your way in. I think you're telling them you're hunting umber. And one thing about a mature buck. If you want to kill him, you want to catch him by sure, in utter surprise. You don't want him to know he's being hunted, or he'll become real nocturnal, real cagey, and real hard to kill. That makes sense, That makes sense. Yeah, Dan, I got a question for you, UM related to difficulty of hunting. UM, do you find um, which of these two situations. Do you find harder to hunt small private parcels that might have a few more mature bucks running around, or large public parcels with you know, less good bucks, more hunting, fresh air, but a lot more room to maneuver. Well, well, obviously there's a lot of cash. Twenty two is to that question. But I guess generally, generally, I would say the bigger property, um, because I can hunt that animal down without the worry of kicking him off the property. Um. I've got information on like like those like those suburban areas where you got five acres or something. It's like, really, you got one spot you can hunt? You don't to me, that's one hunt, you know. Um, But those bigger properties, um, you know that the property by me, I mean it's uh, the one right behind my house is like I think it's close to three thousand acres of swamp and I can probably near a dunt of twelve spots that a giant bucklebean, if he's in the swamp, he'll be one of those twelve spots. Um. There's a lot more better areas than that. But the mature box seem to take these core, you know, primary areas over and uh, you know, you know, then you can can't hunt down here. If I got a spot, I can't hunt. I can't get in here and kill that deer. I mean it's just two and possibly can't get by a quiet you know you've got a bulletproof set up. I'll just go into walk in your and kick him out and then hold them in one of the other spots. Um, I'll walk through there to three days in rows so he doesn't want to bed there. Um. But you can't do that in the small properties. You really got to act, you know, light footed and go and you know at the right time. I think it's really about timing if you've got a small property. Yeah, okay, hey Dan, Um, So you've talked about you know, obviously you're focus and I guess all of our focus we all would you know, ideally want to kill that five and six year old bucks. But there's times, you know, in places maybe where we lower our standards a little bit, at least I know I do. And you've talked about it, Um, can you share some of those places or times where you know it might be a situation where you lower your standards a little bit? Um? And why you why you might do that. Well, I do them public land a little bit, especially if I if I don't have any leaves on something really big. I mean, if I'm on something big, I'm not shooting nothing little. Um. But um, you know, um, I've killed two year old bucks out here that are and uh, that's a big buck to most people. You know. Um, And it's nice to me. But I see a lot of people. I'm changing your question a little here, but I see a lot of people. You know, they want to kill a deer. They want to be a big buck hunter, but they want to kill a deer so to get into these bad habits of hunting deer. And for me, no matter what your what your standard is, you've got to target mature bucks in order to kill mature bucks. I mean, you can target little bucks and you'll kill little bucks, but you're can killing big bucks. Targeting little bucks you have to get lucky. But you can hut big bucks and still get a little I don't mean little, but I mean you know, like a nice two year old or three year old. You can get those by you know, hunting dollars. But you're not gonna kill ma sture bucks unless you hunt the sure, bucks just a different animal. Yeah right, yeah, and that that's a good that's a good question. The um, they you got this younger, newer hunter who wants to do that, but they don't have necessarily many year under their belt at all. At what point is there any advice you can give them? How do they know when they're ready to, you know, go after a big buck versus I mean, yeah, it's all well and good to hold out their big buck, but if they're easy tag soup every year and not getting any experience making the kill, which we all know is really important. You know, I would ever tell somebody how to hunt or what to do or how they should be. But I would recommend that young hunters that want to be good buck hunters don't pass your biggest book because you see that a little bit. You don't where guys a little buck goal because they think they got to do better because your friends are doing better or something. If your biggest buck, I'd never I'd never recommend somebody let that go. You gotta get some killing under your belt in order to be a good hunter. And I've noticed that a lot of the newer generations starting out nowadays. Uh, um, they're trying to hold out for big bucks, and they're talking like they're big buck hunters before they're killing anything, and I think they're missing out on a lot of the hunting. I mean, all the guys I know that are great hunters, and you can time to come wrong with you guys, Joe and Andy, but all the guys I know that are great hunters like us. And I don't know where you started, but you probably started like I did, telling a lot of deer. That's what made us who we are, and then we started slowly adapting into the big box. And I think these younger people want to start out right away killing big bucks. And you've gotta learn how to kill animals and what to do when the deer walks by, and how to act win to pull a ball, and all that stuff that you really can't learn reading about we're hearing about you have to go do and trying to learn how to kill a big buck is not only standing underneath your spand yeah, yeah, that's definitely. I mean my first buck with another and then I shot a four core, and you know, and then I shot a couple more little bucks, and then I shot four or five two year old and you know, it was a while before you know, and and the you know, i'nfortunate to live in a state you know, in Iowa that you know most how dream about and the most the bast I don't know. The first gunman, Big Bucks that I saw, I didn't have a chance in hell killing him. You know, I was a rap. All right. We need to take another quick break here, this time to think our partners at White Tailed Properties, and today I want to plug another one of their land Beat YouTube videos that I think many of you are going to find helpful. This one similar to the last video I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, which features again my friend Ben Harshein discussing habitat and terrain funnels. And again here he uses maps and drone footage and on the ground tour to help you see exactly what these pinch points look like. So he just describes a different couple examples in this video which help out in addition to what he shared in the last one. This episode is titled identifying Funnels on the Map using maps to scout and find great stand locations. Definitely recommend checking this one out. It's a great visualization to help you understand how to identify these types of locations that can be so dynamite during the run. And just to reiterate, you can find these on the white Tail Properties YouTube channel within their land beat video series, and if you want to learn more about white Tail Properties in general, you can visit white Tail properties dot com. Speaking speaking of speaking of newer hunters, um and some of the mistakes or some of the things we're seeing them do. What about this, Dan, I imagine you've seen a lot of people come through the Hunting Beast forum and read about what you guys are doing and start trying it themselves, and they're sharing their experiences on the forum talking about their and see after you year, when you read about all the other guys that are trying to hunt this kind of quote unquote beast style, what's the what's the biggest mistake or what do you still see these people doing wrong? Um? Time after time. I think they think it's too easy. I think they think they're gonna go out there, learn to sing in a season and start killing huge books instantly, like they're reading a manual on how to do it. UM. I think usually if I watched the readers are watched the guys that come onto the Beast, you see probably maybe more than maybe seventy five percent of them stick around for about a year and you don't hear from again. The ones that stick around, you don't really see that success until they've been doing it about three years. And you always see a cocky, arrogant attitude that they're gonna kill these books, that they they found these great bed in areas and they're gonna go out and do it that first year and they've gotta get slapped in the face and and learn that it takes a little more and find it one or two good bed in areas to do it, and they gotta get pumbled and then come back up, rise up, and try hard and not give up. And I see these guys, um just you can withstand that first to or three years. They get to be great hunters after that. Well, you guys think you guys are watching the guys in the Beast. Yeah, i'd have to I'd have to agree. It's a um you know, any time any time you're killing deer, like by focusing on their beds and zeering down on your on their bedding area. Yeah, like you mentioned in in some of your earlier DVDs, Like you gotta put in so much time scouting and find so many of the type of beds and the type of set ups and situations that you're looking for that you're trying to fill a whole season with um. So like you know, you can't. You can't go and and scout and find four beds and you know, think you're gonna knock down couple of big ones next year. I mean you literally, I think you you've you you mentioned that you have more beds that you've scouted. You know that you could probably hunt in the rest of your life. But you know, it's it takes a lot of work to kind of build up that that library of setups and places where you can kind of fall back on as you you know, like you said, you you hunt and you you don't see anything. You know, you hunt, you know, maybe a seven or eight days straight without seeing a single deer, but you all saw you always have that next spot to kind of fall back on due to your scouting and the amount of time and work you put in. So it's not for the faint of heart, and it's not for the type of person that uh you know is it is not ready to kind of commit um commit to it. You know, I think I think guys that maybe can't put in as much time can still find some value um in the in that type of hunting, because you know they might have some some you know, promising setups and betting areas in areas that they hunt that they could focus on. But if you're gonna be a consistent hunter focusing on buck betting, it really takes a lot of commitment and a lot of work in that off season really finding high volume, high numbers of these. At least for me it does, because you know, I tend to I screw up a lot with it, for sure, But you know, you keep you keep at it, You keep fine tuning your setup and your knowledge base. You just get a little bit better at it each time, and you kind of you kind of figure out what you can get away with, you know, a little, I get a little closer than this, right, you know that's a little too, you know, I need to back off a little. All those things come with experience, and it takes time. Yeah, I think, Dan, what you just what you described as far as an average timeline, and everybody's different, and ever how much time you spending on it and different too, but you know, three to five years. Yeah, it's the three to five year investment before you think, before you there's any chance you think you're you're kind of you know, you know what you're doing. I guess in turns of target and hunting, and but you know, I don't. There's lots of times all of us can't figure it out. You know that there's a lot to to where um, maybe you guys can relate with me, But I can go out there and look at something and I don't know how to put it in words, but I can look at them say this is gonna be good, or this you don't suck. But it's really hard to teach it to people how to look at something like that three or five years of investment. That's what it takes. You know, Like, like you get the question, how do you know where to set up that? You know, how do you answer that question? You know you can't, you can't. You know, you can give up some general rules that like you know, some place somewhere, you know you might not be able to get within a hundred yards of a bed. In another place, you might be able to get forty yards from it, you know, right, yeah, it all it all comes back to like you might in in you know, like Dan you said, you have trouble putting those situations into words. It's because like all of your experiences, you know, whether we even realize it or not, it's it's always like fine tuning our judgment. Right, So let me get into these situations where like, okay, you know, you're you're almost subconsciously you know, I've been through this before. I've been through this situation and this worked and this didn't, and this was too much and this was just enough. And you're you're always fine tuning your judgment, and over time, with a lot of experience, you just start making the right call more often, you know, just almost like um, you know, without even really a whole lot of thought, you just feel it. You know, you feel it because you've been there before and you've made the mistakes right. And I would say that time, you know, yeah, if someone doesn't have time, they don't have time, But don't I feel bad for the people that just kind of oh it takes that much time and they lose interest and they wander off. Is to me, that's the fun fire, you know, it's the journey you know it. Um, I don't know, maybe a large, a little different, but that's that's what I love is you know, figure and stuff out and yeah you're gonna screw up. You're gonna start screwing out, screwing up nine percent at the time, and then you're only gonna screw up percent at the time. You know. Yeah, it's fun, you know. Um. I think a big part of it too is uh, blending what they're doing with what we're doing and not jumping in a because I mean, if they're already killing some deer and then you jump in full boat and they see a decline, and I think that's what pushes a lot of people away from it. But if you just start learning how they bed and started putting that into the style you're hunting and slowly go into it, I think you'll have more success and it'll just take longer to get a full boat to where we're at. We talked about like, okay, beginners, most common mistakes, what's what's the d infalts most the mistakes, and like what in your opinion, I know you're you kind of said, you know, maybe your skill level is kind of tapered off the last few years because you know, maybe the drive isn't quite there. But what would take Dan Infult to the next level? What do you what? What could you improve on? I think, Um, you know, I'm always analyzing um my haunts and uh my seasons and stuff. Um that's just a natural part of me. And my analyzation of this last season was I didn't shoot enough, I didn't practice enough, and I blew a lot of opportunities. I think I gotta focus on my practice a little more. I think I need to focus on scouting a little more for myself instead others. If I want to be more successful. I think I don't put the time in that I used to, either shooting or scouting. I think last year I had four or five opportunities and I blew every one of them. Do you have like a specific game plan as far as how to address that. Is it just quantity of practice or do you need to Are you changing anything else? As far as I am changing something up this year, Um, I'm finding that my judgment is getting worse. Um where I'm not judging my shot distance. I used to just use one pin in a rangelind or anything. And I'm gonna go with adjustable pin. This you're in a rangefinder for the first time. Okay, and then we're about scouting. You mentioned maybe you need to scout some more, and we're alluding to this a little bit earlier, just about how much work it takes to find enough places two hunt in this kind of way because you're going from betting area to betting area and you might blow it up. Um. I think we hear that a lot, but sometimes newer people don't really know what that actual. You know exactly how much that is. So what's like the ballpark number that maybe you typically go into a season with Danny? Do you have like forty beds? Do you have two beds? I mean, what what should a new guy be thinking? I have no idea account wise. I mean, there's hundreds and thousands of much guess would blow the way out of the park. But um, it's not really about how many bed in areas. I know I already got that stuff down me personally. When I'm scouting right now, I'm looking for bucks I learned because I'm a low buck density area, so I want to know where those maketure bucks are so I know where to go after certain animals. So that's a scouting I need to personally, uh key and on. But for other people, I think you need to find as many buck betting areas as you can and have set ups on them, and then you know, you need to monitor those areas and see when there's a buccan area to go in to hunt. I mean we rubb lines open up when you when you see one out of a window that you know the area. Okay, if I'm seeing a buck here, you know, and it's a month season and I'm seeing him in a field just before dark, where is he coming from? And uh that kind of stuff, and you already know the area already, have it scouted? Um for got it just has you know, and buck betting areas scouted. It doesn't know a lot about them. That it gets pretty tough. And I think a younger guy or aknewer guy UM should probably concentrate on one property and learn all the bet in that one property first, because it's easier to hunt on a property then it is to hunt one spot on each property because there's a good odds to box in some other spot. But if there's a buck on that property and you hunt that property down, you're you're more likely to kill. Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up. Dan. That was I had needed to ask you was if you recommend how you recommend it, somebody start, you know, start and folks learn something really well or spread yourself out. You answer that, thanks, Say, Dan, you talked about monitoring these different betting years. Then once you find them. One of the ways that I think some people think about monitoring a betting area or a region of a property is with trail cameras. But I heard you talk about last year at least how trail cameras maybe misled you a little bit in that way. Um, is that something that you see happen more often the trail cameras out of hurting you more than they help you in some cases, or or is there a certain way we should be thinking about and make sure they don't well. Cameras can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Um. Do you find people that get addicted to them things in or to putting them in places they shouldn't, then you're checking them all the time, um, you know, or there, or they got them in a spot where they really couldn't kill something anyways, and then they're every time they see something under to change your whole game plan towards it. I think the best thing you can do with the trail cameras. Have you got a bed in area or a rub line that comes out of a bed area and it's a hundred yards back or somewhere a couple hundred yards back, and maybe to have a camera there, um, But I really wouldn't recommend having them where you hunt, unless it's the email type that email you the picture. And even then I put it their way in advance. Yeah, yeah, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta get the intel and and use that intael for something. I think a lot of the ways I like to use trail cameras is to put them on a food source, um, always away from betting where it has no impact in the bedding at all, and just know it's there's a big buck in that area and that woods, and then I know the betting I can go after him. But I think a lot of the younger people or newer people to this uh, to this way of hunting, I have to build their confidence up and they have to believe that there's a buck in that betting here, and that's why they put those cameras so close, but I think that's hurting number. Uh. Holy those deer get to be you know, four years old or older and pressured land without knowing that game. When somebody walks inplace, they know I don't go there tomorrow and daylight. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. Andy, Andy, what we're gonna say there? Before I interrupted you, Oh, I was gonna ask Dan, what what type of terrain or habitat do you find the most difficult for you to hunt? Um? H hill country probably Um you get you have a hard time getting close enough. You know, you get below you into normal rise and you get a ball, you get the wind blowing at him. So you gotta find that little niche to get on them. And it's not that I find it really difficult to hunt it. It's just it's it's a struggle, you know, and kind of like it's a little more challenging to me. Sometimes it's funner, but it is a little more challenging to get within that window of killing gear. Um. All the rest of the drains, I think that I get closer. Is there a certain type of hills that we've we've talked a little bit about this other places, certain type of hills that you find the most difficult. You know, they range from you know, you have big, great, big steep bluffs in that gentle rolling hill. Um, yeah, for sure, the rolling hills are much harder. The rolling hills are much harder, and especially for scouting, just finding the betting areas in those rolling hills is tough because, um, in the steep bluffs, they're right at the point where that thermal wind meat and a worn in you know, you can seem really well. But in those rolling hills, um, they're instantly shift in their beds, so it's hard to tell, you know, if you've been bedding or a lot. You know. Yeah, that's what I've seen too. And the deepest hills that's where I find the heaviest, most you know, um defined bet because it's flat out there's less options, I think, you know. Yeah. Another betting question that I that I've wanted to get a little bit more from you on Dan is just how betting might change throughout the year. I've heard you talk a little bit about how it transitions from early season to late season in different types of terrain, but can you can you talk about that a little bit, how that might change and like a hill country situation versus a swamp or farm country type situation. Uh, you know, hill country. I see him betting on those uh those leeward ridges all year. Um. Farms and swamps. I see see a little different though, UM Like right now, um going out water on farms and a scull and then glasses and stuff. I'm seeing a lot of them big box are bedding up on the open field, UM, in the in the grass cover, um, right out in the places where they normally don't. And I think it's to get away from the mosquitoes. I don't think they want to be done in that water area. But they seem to be a long ways away from the water right now on um, up in the higher stuff. But once the season comes, they just start moving right back into that stuff. And I'm hitting them right into the same place as I always do. But then early season and finding them around the acorns, you know, and vice verse. You starting to follow the routine of the food sources or whatever they're looking for for that time of the year. And one thing I noticed though, um that you can see distinct patterns. So if you hunt a wooden lot like like I think it was Joe was saying earlier, if you hunt one wood lot and learn it, well, you just start to see that when you've seen a big box in a certain area, that exact time date, time frame right down to the week, is when you should be hunting that area in the next year. It's not a coincidence. I don't think there's a big Bucks to do anything on coincidence. So there's like food patterns and timing patterns they moved through an area. Do you see that change as a buckets older at Although if you ever have a buck that you've seen maybe a couple of years in a row, do you see that? Um? You know, some people talk about how these home ranges tend to get tighter and tighter and tighter as these bucks get older and older. Anything anything else like that I can say about older box is this is that And this will probably strike a few people wrong, but it's really what I've I've observed, and I believe I think older bucks are easier to hunt, and the reason being is they get locked into those primary better areas, just hold up there and stay there, and they're hard to kick out. You kick them out to come right back in where those younger bucks seem to you kick them out, they moved to another spot. Um. But those older bocks seem to really find an area where hardly anybody goes, and they just stay there and they're harder to push out of that area. Um. And they'll move further for food, you know, they'll during the night, they'll go to a food source or whatever. And is that do you think that's just because they they found something that works for them and it's kept them alive for so long, and now they're they're setting that way like this has worked for me for five years? Why change it out? It's hard for It's hard for me to tell you what the books thinking. But uh, I don't know if it's through experiences. I don't you know, I don't know what causes it. But I see that in in not only on pressured private I see it on on the managed stuff I've hunted and help people with two let's see the same thing. Yeah, Well, what's I'm curious to you know, I look up to Joel and Andy a lot. I'm curious that they've seen that same type of behavior. Yeah, I I have definitely, and I like, you know, living where I do, I am very fortunate older deer and once that bockheads five six years old, they've become very very patternable. Now those patterns aren't easy by any means, but if you're you know, on your game, once you find them. I've I've come into run into a lot of bucks where they are they make their home and a woodlock or one small drainage and they're in forty eight acres. It seems like if you think about it now, most of your hunters are on a pattern of rotating through steams and they never move up the pattern. They'll get them. You know, they don't go mobile, and you've got to go mobile and go find it. There's pattern in order to kill. Yeah, and it's those areas that they find they are never hunted. You know, they're they're there there. You know, they speak out these areas because for whatever reason, people aren't you hunting it. You know, we've gotten the edges or whatever where they're actually button. Nobody ever goes. It's a really small area when you find that. You know, the proprobial overlook spot. Yeah, what about you, Andy? Yeah? Yeah, I have I have seen that too, Like the buck, uh that buck I killed last year. Um, that's a perfect explanation, um, of of how I killed that dear. You know, he just I it took me three years to get him, but um, it just really kept fine tuning UM and what he was seeing. Um, he was seen in some areas that were kind of quite a ways away from where I had killed him, and he had been shot at a few times. So I had some different guys around the area, and he really ended up just zeroing into this little tiny corner along this river corridor, and uh, you know, I mean he spent you know, as far as I could tell, UM. You know, he was spending the majority of his time there, and I was getting a couple of pictures UM of him, and he was always kind of coming and going, always coming that coming from that direction, going back. And uh it really because I because I come to know that buck really well. It became a pretty straightforward set up on how to get him. I just had the time it right, and you know, on a day where he was moving in daylight and that sort of thing. So and I would point out, even though they're in a small area, does not mean they're visible there there. They are often just about the individible, you know, they're not walking in front of where you normally put your tree. If you put a trail camera on a certain tree every single year and check it, you know regularly, they may be an area and they just know not to walk in front of your camera, you know, or you know they're not walking by your stand, but they might be. You know, you might be regularly hut in the stand and that buck might be bet in two hundred yards away and he knows you're there, He knows you're regularly there, and he just never will show himself just because you don't see every not there. You're like, you're you know, hunting nor always you know, the same old stand, all that kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, what else do you got, Joe? Any other questions top of mind for you? Um? One question I got for you, Dan, is you know, if you could give yourself a piece of advice, uh, you know from you know, if you could give yourself a piece of advice thirty years ago, what would it be in terms of just hunting in general, like maybe how to or how not to? You know what, what would have helped you the most? If you could tell yourself a thirty year younger version of yourself something. Jeez, I know there will be a lot. Yeah, I don't know. It's probably be something to do with family, uh, you know, and how I spend my time. I was, as we alluded to earlier, I was a pretty obsessed with hunting back then. So basically you know that now you're talking a little bit or yeah, I worry a little bit more about work, about family, about my kids. Unlike you guys, I had kids early. I think I think the biggest one for me was I put a lot of pressure on my middle son, who, um it was the only one that really liked hunting, and I think I pressured him right out of liking it, you know. Um. To me, Um, I liked the working hunting, you know, the the hyke back three miles in a swamp with us standing and set up. But I really never thought about him not liking that part of it. And I think I pushed him a little too hard. Um. You know, Uh, I think I would rather have made it more fun for him. You know. I think back to my younger days, or all my days for that matter. The hunts I remember the most aren't those giant bucks. I killed the ones that that that remember the most of my first book, the first year with the bulb, but times chasing those deer around just having fun where it was just trying to kill a deer. Um. And I think, you know, my son missed that a little bit. Uh. He shot three bucks in his life, and I think the smallest one scores about one ten or one point. He's never shot a dough um, So I think I kind of pushed him into missing some of that, you know. And yeah, that's that's interesting to hear. It's something I've been thinking about a lot about myself too, with um, with my first son being born. He's just six months old now, and so I'm I'm thinking a lot about how do you go about introducing a child to the outdoors and hunting and how do you you know, to your point, Dan, I could see myself doing the same thing. I'm so excited about. I'm so passionate about it, so hardcore about it, that how do I temper that down to to work, you know, to still have fun for him and to to not overwhelm him. Um, that seems like something could easily happen, right. You gotta remember he's not you, you know, I wanted Jamie to be me you know, I wanted to be like me and be who I was, and I don't think that's realistic. And you know, I think a lot of people will probably criticize me for talking about that, but it's you know, it's true, and I think it will probably help somebody else by saying yeah, no, I agree. Yeah, I appreciate you bringing that up. And I thought about that as well with my kids. You know, how to how to bring him into nothing. But I'm so passionate about but I do worry about burning about Yeah, I kinda want to flip that a little bit. Dan. Now, so you being so hardcore about it, you being so obsessed with things maybe ended up being a detriment when it came to introducing hunting to your to your family with your son um. But now I want to talk about the the intangible things about you that have made you so successful. What if you could put your finger on any trait or habit or routine or some intangible thing but what you do or who you are, Is there anything you can point to on that level that do you think has led to your success? Has it just been that hard core nature or is there something else? I'll tell you that that this is gonna sound horrible, but it's true that the number one thing with me is is that cocky, arrogant belief that I'm gonna kill a bug. It's mental power. You have to believe in yourself. If you really believe you're gonna do it, Um, you'll go out and you'll do the job. You'll do the work, you'll do that you know, you'll push yourself that far. Um And I think a lot of people that fail it's it's because of their mind. I don't think it's because they necessarily know that much less. I think the difference between maybe um Me and Indian and Joe and some of the newer guys on the site isn't really the knowledge, because I think it's all pretty much out there. I think a lot of it's the experience and the belief in ourselves. I think, uh, I go out there just believe in that I'm gonna do it. I think every time I go into wood, I believe I'm gonna kill that deerham after, you know, I believe that's the day I'm gonna kill him. And when I don't, I get up the next morning to go out there just as happy, still believe and I'm gonna kill that deer that day. Do you think that is just is that just a personality trait? Or is that actually because you've put in so much time and effort and work and scouting, you have so much experience that you realistically do have that confidence because of all that skills that you have already, or is both? Yeah, I don't think you can buy that experience and and I don't think you can teach that experience. I think it's I think it's about putting on, you know, pile of bucks on the wall that you you just start to believe that this works. You know, I'm gonna do it. And and I believe in my setups, I believe in my scouting, and I think it's gonna work. Every time I go out there, I really believe that this is the spot that book is going to be better than, and this is where he's gonna come out. And if I didn't have that belief, I probably wouldn't get up to you out there. And I think that's why a lot of other people fail. I think it's why they leave early, why they lacking confidence. And the only way you can get that is to go out there and kill some bucks and build that confidence up. Yeah. Yeah, a lot of times it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy too. You know, you kind of alluded to it. If you don't have confidence in your setup or your strategy when you're sitting out there, if you're not confident, you're maybe not paying as much attention, or you're not willing to stay till the very last minute, or you're not willing to get out there two hours before dark because you and well it's probably not gonna work out anyway. So lots of times just that confidence will push you or will allow you to do the things you know you need to do. Um, you know you need just that. I mean, you're on the stand, I'm listening, I'm watching, I'm hearing things in the distance. I'm looking for movement and stuff. But I think other people, you know, are sitting or daydream and things are are going on if they're not even noticing. And and I know that's little, but I think the differences between a great hunter and an okay hunter is little things. You know, It's you know a lot of those little things add up and that's what makes you successful. Yeah yeah, yeah, your mindset huge you know when you're when you're thinking about, you know, what might be going wrong. Um, if you just about guarantee, you're gonna screw it up. I've been in situations where you know, uh, you know, I have a coming in earlier in my career and I would there's no way I can screw this up. You know, I don't know that you have that mindset, then you're gonna screw it up. So got the stories to prove it once. But you know when it comes when you see a deer and you think I'm going to kill that dear, you're gonna kill it? Is there is there anything, Joe, that you could point to if I were to take that question. I just gave it to Dan and point that back to you. Do you have any any other intangible quality or routine or habit or mindset other than we just talked about that has that's helped you? Yeah? And I think you know, I'm kind of a student of observing people's personality, so I think this fits to Dan as well. Um, we're persistent, and that is I don't know if you want to say it's learned or it comes natural, that's statable, I guess, But you gotta be persistent, and you gotta you know that. That's how we can go out there again and again and fail and keep going and keep believing in it is your persistent and you don't get burned out in a way of you know, that negative self talk that really takes you down. You just you just you know, that's a really good point. You know, I've never seen somebody that's been successful beast talking. That's lazy. You try to have a strong work ethic. I mean, you gotta like the work, wouldn't you when you drink? Yeah, exactly. You gotta love the work. That's that's that's how you sum it up. You gotta love the work. You gotta love sweating your butt off and out, you know, a mile and mile out, two miles and two miles out. You gotta want to you got to want to drag that buck out two miles. You know everybody, you know they went to somebody asked, so, I don't you know it isn't that too far? Well, yeah, that's probably just not for you. Then if you're worried about how far the drag is gonna be, you know, right, you know, you hear all those people say, well, I'd never shoot a buck in that spot because of how far but draggedd is. Or I wouldn't even hunt there because of that you actually for you guys, But I've never ever thought about how I'm gonna gear out until it's dead. Yeah yeah, yeah, exactly What about you, Andy, what's your intangible that you would add? Um? Yeah, I mean I'd go right along with what both Dan and Joe said. I think, you know, I'm just I'm extremely thorough like with my scouting. So I think I mentioned this before, but like you know, and I know Joe does this, but I'm I'm thorough enough in my scouting where it would almost have to be some you know, really really bad luck, extremely bad luck for me to not at least have some success. So I don't like leaving a lot of things to chance. Um So, and I love the preparation. I love the scouting even you know, even more than the hunt in a lot of times, a lot of ways. So I'm just extremely thorough with with all of that. Just to kind of put I think that just kind of puts all the odds in my favor, at least enough of the odds in my favor. Um. But then I have like this, I don't know, I have this like constant drive to improve, like not to be the best hunter. I don't care about that, but I have to be. I always have to be improving with the things that I'm passionate about. And I don't know why that is, but like being stagnant in anything that I'm really passionate about, it like it almost makes me ill. I get anxiety about it. It's weird, but I just I constantly have to be improving about the you know, with the things that I'm passionate about, only about you know, a couple of a couple of things. So that that's why those tend to get you know, the majority of my time. Yeah, yeah, that If I feel uncertain about something, it drives me not. I hate that. And then I think, you know, you know, you know, you guys sound like you guys know what I mean. You know, like if I how to hunt of property, it drives me not and I'm gonna keep going back, keep going back, being figured, trying to figure it out. It's funny how similar we are, the three of us. You hear with all the different people I talked to over the years through the podcast, there are definitely. These all these intangibles you just mentioned, they're the same things that come up for almost every single person. And these all these different people. They might hunt in totally different ways. Some guys don't hunt at all, like you Dan, or you and your Joe, but they still have these core kind of pieces parts of like who they are that seems to be consistent across all you guys and many of the other best hunters out there. So it's it's almost like if you have these core things, if you're persistent, if you're willing to care about the little things, if you're willing to to put in an unbelievable amount of time and effort and energy and keep that positive attitude, if you can do those things, you'll eventually find the style of hunting that works for you. Um, but those things are the keys that seems to be very consistent. Yeah, that's that's one of the reasons why I learned, and maybe I'll change as I gained maturity as a hunter. But I try to not go after one particular block because it just consumes me to the point I'll wake up at two am and stare at the ceiling for three hours thinking about that darned dear. You know, so I try not to, I really, you know, I try to keep that under control. So and everybody's different, you know, but it's just a quirk. Yeah, Joe or Andy, do either you guys have any other any other big ones we want to run by Dan? Uh No, I don't have any more questions for Dan, but I do want to say something to him. I don't know, are we are we ending this thing? Yeah? Yeah, I think maybe maybe kind of concluded here. I've got I've got kind of one more question, but but yeah, if you want to conclude with some thoughts, Andy, that'd be good. Well, it's more of a I guess I thank you. Um. I just wanted to say thank you to Dan because you know, he's someone that I look up to. I never had I never had a mentor, you know, like nobody got me into hunting. I actually started archery and then uh I was you know, decent at archery, and people are like, oh, that's kind of how I started hunting. Um. So you know the people that were mentors, you know, I learned a lot with trial and there, but Dan was certainly like one of my mentors. Um for sure, I've learned a ton from him. You know, he's never I respect him a ton. He's never really sought out, notari pushed products and actually tries to steer you know, the guys that the Hunting Beast away from him, you know, and he's super generous with his time and his information for I mean, how many years, how many years has he been doing this? It's you know, it's amazing. So he just has like a natural, nonsense way of teaching and explaining things, something that I think doesn't come so natural to me. Like for him, he's just really easy to listen to and it just comes off real naturally. And I think he'll you know, I really think he's going to go down as one of the great real world hunters. And I know that's not a big deal to him, but you know, because of the the commitment um you know, the long longevity and the willingness to share and teach. So you know, I just I'm really thankful and like on behalf of everyone listening and the guys that Hunting Beasts, I just want to say thank you. I completely agree and your role Bottle, I will flat out says, you know, have taught me a lot and how to conduct myself. I feel like and I think that points on them. Well, absolutely, you know, I kind of look up to you guys too. I think you guys are some of the top guys on the site. I mean you to talk. I always listen, So so then I'll wrap it up. I'll wrap it up with this stand. Um, We've asked you a lot of questions. You get thousands of questions on the Beast, You get all sorts of questions from other people on all these different podcasts and people interviewing you for all these different things. Is there any question that you haven't been asked yet that you wish you had not that? I can think of people asking the craziest questions like what favorite ice cream is? With car I drive? And sometimes there's nothing that you've really wanted to talk about that no one ever and never ends up diving into huh No I do. I do feel like most podcasts, um, I mean, it's guys that don't Beast Hunt, so they don't ask the right questions and it's just the same stuff over and over again. I really like the format you had on this one, and this is really cool. It was it was a good idea you had Um. I think we've got some good stuff off there. People like this? Yeah, yeah, I definitely enjoyed it too. What's your favorite my favorite venison recipe? Um, A couple of sticks of butter and some chopped up uh venison in a lot of vegetables. It's fried. Yes, I think you got that on YouTube. I think I remember that. Yeah, that sounds it's not buttery enough. Just keep that in butter and salt. So dan um. I guess I'll just ask you then, what what do you want to send people to? What should people that are listening to this that, you know, if somehow they haven't heard heard about you or the Hunting Beast, What do you want them to go do next? Do you want them to just check out the forum? Do you want to send them to your DVDs? Um? Where can they find all that kind of stuff? You know? Um? Uh, my hunting forums by a great place to go. There's a lot of free uh tactical discussion on here. And that's the Hunting Beast dot com. I've got a great YouTube channel. I mean you got to filter through some stuff because I love to put clips up there of chasing down possums and catching them, but there's still some really good uh tactical deer videos in here that are really pretty cool to around for him. And then we got a Facebook page. UM, I've got some really good tactical DVDs. But you don't have to buy those. You can get that, you know, if you do the research. Everything's online free. UM, just come onto the site. We've got a site that's uh as so free. UM. We don't allow any bullying or anything. We get rid of people as soon as they start, so it's a real easy going where anybody can talk, anybody can ask any questions they want. Awesome, Well, I would just echo everything that Joe and Andy said. You know, over the years, I've I've followed your stuff for a long time now too, and it's been tremendously helpful and hearing from our list ers, they'd all agree to. I think a lot of people can point to you being tremendous resource. So thank you for all that worked in and thanks for joining us again here on the podcast. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me out and that will do it first today, So thank you all for tuning in. Hope you enjoyed this one as much as we enjoyed putting it together. To wrap it up, just want to remind you that if you haven't left a rating or review on iTunes, that's a huge help. I also want to make sure you're following along with what we've got going on with the Weird Hunt over on our Facebook page, the Instagram account, Twitter, and the YouTube videos and putting out new videos every week right around now. Just recently we've started a series of videos including Andy again talking about target panic in some ways to to beat target panic, which is something we talked through on a podcast a handful of weeks to go with him when we were answering listener questions. So check that one out, and of course, most importantly, thank you all so much for listening. I appreciate you sharing your time with us here and until next time, stay wired to HUT that