A Little Q and A

This week's episode of the Oklahoma Outdoors Podcast is all about the fans! Before recording this week's episode, John reached out via social media and asked for questions from listeners. The topics reached far and wide from choosing a good rifle caliber to protecting your deer feeders from cows. Cows came up more than once actually! While most of the questions were serious or strategic in nature, there were a few fun ones also that let John do a little bit of daydreaming about hunting moose in the Alaskan Bush with Jim Shockey!

[00:00:00] Hey guys and gals, welcome to the Oklahoma Outdoors Podcast, brought to you by Arrowhead Land Company. Here you'll be educated, entertained, and equipped to get more out of your outdoor experience. So hold on tight because here we go.

Good morning or afternoon or evening whenever you might be listening to this podcast. Welcome to the show. This is the Oklahoma Outdoors Podcast, and I'm your host. John Husk. I hope everybody's doing wonderful out there. But I gotta start this episode with a little bit of a rant. I am about to rant a little bit about the state of Iowa and how they do their non-resident tags.

So obviously, Iowa's a great whitetail state, great whitetail destination, and it's that way for a reason. It's that way because they [00:01:00] limit. Out-of-state hunters and all that good stuff. But trying to get this tag has just been a huge headache, and I'm sure y'all are gonna hear me talk about this more.

I'll keep you up to date. But anyway, so I've been putting in for, I believe, six years, actually five years, and I missed a year, so that makes it six. So this is my seventh year doing something with the state of Iowa. And I went to actually apply for a tag for the first time. So in the past I've always just gotten preference points, but this is the year I'm actually putting in for the tag.

I'm actually gonna go try to hunt there, and it has just been a huge headache. Logged in over the weekend, I was like, all right, the time is right. I've been been talking to some folks from Iowa maybe trying to get some. Some, landowner permission, trying to figure out if I'm gonna do private versus public, what zone and everything.

Cause like your tag's not just good for the whole state. You have to pick like an area. So I've been working through all that. Finally on Saturday I was like, all right, time to sit down and actually do this thing. So I go click on apply, [00:02:00] and a little warning thing comes up that says I don't know, user not.

Able to apply user, not valid, something like that. So start doing a little research and come to find out, in order to apply, you have to buy a license. Not a big deal. I could buy a license and keep going, but in order to buy a license, they have to have your hunter safety card on file. And unfortunately, of course, being a, government entity.

They are not open on weekends. They are not open after five o'clock, and so when most people you know in their free time go to apply for the tag, It's just impossible unless you've already done this before. So Saturday got my card or whatever, got a picture of it, sent it in, had to wait until Monday.

I will say they got back to me fairly quickly. Got back to me on Monday and my card is now in the system so I can go in and apply now I. Think I haven't actually done it yet but I think I am now able to apply. So I think part of the [00:03:00] reason that the deer hunting is so good in Iowa is because they just try to make it so darn confusing and hard for out-of-state hunters that everybody just gives up.

And so well done Iowa, good strategy. But I'm gonna get to the bottom of this and I will come this fall and do some deer hunting. So still gotta draw the tag. I think I talked about it on a previous episode with the amount of points that I have, the unit I'm trying to draw. I wanna say I have somewhere in a 70 to 80%.

Chance of drawing. So a pretty good chance. So I've been studying the maps, been looking at public places like I said, still been trying to talk to a few landowners. I actually came really close to driving to Iowa this weekend for Memorial Day. But decided not to do that to my poor wife and leave her alone with the baby and everything.

So anyway, not going to Iowa this weekend, but I just had to get that off my chest. And also inform you guys, if y'all are doing the whole circus and trying to go hunt Iowa, just be aware that you need to go right now, even if you plan to not, put in until the [00:04:00] future. You need to go and email them a picture of your hunter's safety card so that they have it on file, so that when the time comes, you can actually apply for the tags.

All right, rant over. I don't think that was too awful long. Welcome to the show this week. Not a lot going on. We had a crazy hectic weekend last weekend. I had my nieces and nephew's birthday. We took them to the zoo. What else? We had a wedding. We had a graduation party. I think I mentioned the birthday party already.

My wife's mom was in town. My wife's brother was in town. My sister from Nebraska was in town. It was just a whole lot. We were running and getting nonstop all week really. It went past the weekend too cuz the family stayed in town Monday, Tuesday, I think Also my poor baby girl is wiped out.

She has been having so much fun. All day long and she has been sleeping like a champ at night, which is pretty awesome because mom and dad [00:05:00] definitely needed to catch up on some sleep also. So all that to say, haven't really done any outdoorsy things to catch you up on. I mentioned I got all my food plots and stuff playing a few weeks ago.

I think I might make it out to the ranch this weekend to check in all that stuff, but I'm not sure yet. This Friday actually, when you're listening to this, it would've been last Friday is actually my birthday, the big 34. And so I have permission for my wife to do whatever I want. Just haven't figured out.

I really wanted to get my boat out and go fishing for the first time this year. But Memorial Day weekend, the lake's gonna be crowded, so don't really know how. Fun. That sounds I don't know. All I know is I want to eat a big, giant steak and sleep. Like those are the two big things that I really want to do.

Yeah, no idea what's going on this this coming weekend. Didn't do anything outdoorsy last weekend, so not much to update you guys on. But anyway, this week we have what I think is going to be a really cool episode. I was struggling a little bit basically with all the craziness, I forgot to contact someone to get a [00:06:00] guest on the show.

And so at the last minute I had an idea to do a question and answer show, which I've been one to do for a while. I think I actually tried to do one last year. So yeah, I put it out on Instagram. Any questions you might want to ask? I've got a couple good ones here. I'm sure I might get a few more while I'm recording and so that is what's on the docket today, so I hope you guys are ready for it.

I'm actually pretty excited. We got some really good questions and we will get into that right after this. There is truly no place like the great outdoors in Oklahoma. When you're out in the wild, you want your wireless devices to work unlike other carriers. Bravado Wireless believes that coverage in rural areas is important so that you stay connected with competitively priced plans and coverage where you need it.

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Arrowhead land company, hardworking agents for hardworking landowners. All right guys and gals, it's time to get into the q and a portion of the podcast, and I'm pretty darn excited about a few of these questions. So the first one we're gonna start off with is one of my favorites. And somebody asked about insight into taking kids hunting.

And I might take this in a little bit d different direction than some of y'all might think. But first off, I do have a daughter, but she is not even one years old yet. So I have not gotten to take my own child hunting, but I do have. I think 12 nieces and nephews, a couple of the older ones are getting into, the [00:08:00] outdoor age.

I also have tons of friends that I've gone hunting with who, and taken their kids and everything like that. Yes, this is a thing that's near and dear to my heart. So the first thing I wanna say is I think a lot of people, when they. Picture hunting with their kids, they're probably deer hunting, in a nice box blind or something.

A giant buck walks out, they shoot it and they get to share this awesome moment with their kids. But unfortunately I think that deer hunting is probably one of the worst ways to get your kids involved in the outdoors. If you're talking big picture, like if you're one, trying to make a lifelong hunter, just if you look at it from the outside's perspective you're sitting for long periods of time, more than likely it's cold.

There's a chance of not seeing anything. There's an even bigger chance of not shooting anything. And so if you just think of it from a kid's perspective, sitting there for a long time. Bored, cold, nothing going on. It's just not a great recipe to get a kid really involved.

And so [00:09:00] I think the best way is to just pick something with a little bit more action. For me my dad's not a big hunter, but he did love dove hunting. That's how I started out. And dove hunting I think is one of the best ways to get. Kid involved because, it's action packed, lots of shooting.

You can get them interact, like I love, my dad would shoot a bird bef, I, I couldn't carry a gun, but my dad would shoot a bird, I'd be his bird dog. I'd be running out there looking for it, getting it, bringing it back to him. So it just, it got me involved even though I wasn't old enough to actually shoot.

And so dove hunting's great. Small game hunting, rabbit hunting. My brother, we've taken his kids duck hunting several times and we make sure, like we just don't, we just don't take them to take them. We try to wait until, the weather's right. There's, we've scouted me a little bit and we like, there's we know when we go there's going to be ducks and there's going to be action.

And it can be tough, You, you got more bodies, ducks obviously have good eyes. We try to have a, a blind or have them tucked, way up into the trees or something to where they can still see, but [00:10:00] they're hidden and so it, it is tougher. But trying to do something like that's a little bit more action packed, I think is really good.

If you're talking long term now, if you are t talking deer hunting, cause I know a lot of people. Want to take their kids deer hunting and I'm the same way. I think again, you gotta be very careful with when and how you take them. Opening day when it's super hot, maybe not the best time prime rut when you're trying to kill a trophy buck and you're super focused.

Probably also not a great time, even though there might be a lot of action. But just you wanna make sure you can focus on the kid just as much as you're focused on the hunting. And so for me I've been dreaming about this for years. When I take my daughter deer hunting for the first time probably is going to be in a, a stand a box blind, something like that.

Somewhere comfortable. Most likely going to be like a late October. Evening hunt. So that way she doesn't have to wake up early. It's, cool, but not cold, that type of thing. And I more likely than not, I [00:11:00] just wanna take her to shoot a dough, probably like a feeder set up or a food plot.

If I take her hunting, I want to make sure that there will be a deer. In front of us that she gets to see. And I also wanna make sure that it's a deer that I'm most likely going to shoot. So again a dough, maybe there's like a coal buck that you know you've had on camera or something like that.

Again, I just you want to make sure there's action taking a kid to sit in a box for four hours or three hours, whatever. And nothing happens. That's just a big letdown, if you're talking about an eight year old or something like that. I know one thing that's brought up a lot is like iPads or phones or, like basically do you let a kid have technology or do you make 'em sit there?

And I like to think that I would do something in between. I don't think I want my kid to have an iPad in the deer blind, or that's their sole fo focus, playing a game or watching a movie. For me, I think like coloring books are good or, a regular book, but maybe an outdoorsy type book.

All there's a hundred books out there about, little [00:12:00] boys and their dogs or little kids and their dogs or whatever. Have them coloring pictures of deer or rabbits or something. Something that's gonna get their mind. Focused on being outside and outdoors and get that imagination going.

I remember one of my favorite books as a kid, I think it was called Big Red. It was about a boy who lived out in the woods with his dad. He got to take care of this red, like nice Irish setter. They talked about, running trap lines and there was a bear, that stalked him and the dog saved the boy from the bear.

And I loved, adventurous stories like that. And it made me want to get outside more. So again, I hope that's not too big of a letdown. But that's just my thoughts on getting kids in the outdoors. And please do it. Because we need more hunters and it's just gonna be a very special time with kids.

So first question, taking kids hunting, I think it's important to get something exciting and interactive to where the child gets involved Also. All right on to question three. Question three is, you kill [00:13:00] great deer on private. Why do you also hunt public? And this is a tricky answer, and honestly it's morphed a little bit over the years.

So I killed a good deer in 2013. I killed a good deer in 20 14, 20 15. There was really only one buck that I was interested in shooting. And neighbor ended up killing it and 20 or 2016 rolled around and there just weren't really any bucks on our property that I was interested in. I had an older buck, like a one 20 ish eight point that I would've shot just cause he was super old.

But it just seemed like there was an age gap. Like I had some super old deer that weren't very high scoring. And then I had some nicer younger deer that I didn't really want to shoot. And so I just had this weird gap. And that was also about the time that I found what would later become the hunting public guys.

I think at that time they were still with Midwest Whitetail. But Aaron Warbritton and Zach Farba they were still working for [00:14:00] Midwest Whitetail, but they did all public land hunting. And that was. I don't know. It was just very intriguing to me because it wasn't your traditional, like television, entertainment type hunting even, they were working for Bill Winky, who was very much fit that mold.

But man I started watching their videos with Midwest Whitetail and I was like, these guys are really hunting. And granted they were hunting mostly Iowa, but they were hunting all public land. And and I was just super intrigued and I started learning so much because they were having to hunt deer.

Like actually hunt deer. Like they weren't just sitting on food plots or over feeders or anything, like they were truly hunting deer. And so I started applying those same things to my private land hunting. But it also for the first time ever got me interested in public. And so again, that year I didn't really have anything I was interested in chasing.

And I actually found out there was some public pretty close [00:15:00] by, so I started exploring it and I was a little turned off at first because the first place I went, I went to kinda like the obvious easy places like most people do. And I saw tons of tree stands. I found trash, trail, like human trails and stuff.

Stuff. And so right away I was kinda like most people, I was very turned off of public. But the more I learned from those guys, I also started that was when the hunting beast was getting big and that really blew my mind, the whole buck betting thing and everything. And again, like they're finding all this stuff and having all this success on public land.

And so that kind of pushed me and the more I learned, the more I was like, all right, gotta look for those out of the way places, gotta look for the, the places that most people won't go to, like that type of thing. So I started exploring more public land and I started finding some good areas, some places where I wasn't seeing tree stains and I was seen more deer sign and rubs and scrapes and all this stuff.

It just turned into this challenge and the more I explored, the better [00:16:00] I felt about it. I started putting out, I think the first year I put out one camera and actually got some pictures of some pretty nice bucks. I don't think I actually even ended up hunting public that year, but got some good pictures.

But over time it's morphed into Oh, it's just it's another place to hunt. Nowadays, like I, I have some good deer to hunt. I love our property, but they're, our property is very difficult to hunt and there are certain winds that just don't work. And so if I want to go hunting and things Aren right on my property, I find myself going to the public land.

Just added places. And then one thing that I just figured out really in the last. I'm gonna say honestly, in the last year and oddly enough, I didn't really learn it on public. I learned it when I went to Nebraska last year. I went up there I had permission on some private and everything like that, but I had never stepped foot on the property.

I went there to hunt and I had never stepped foot on the property and so I just started exploring and I was putting on the miles. I was, following [00:17:00] terrain features. I was looking at habitat types. I was looking for edge, and I learned so. Stinking much, just trying to figure out where on earth I could put my tree stand up to try to get a deer.

And so after that trip when I came back to Oklahoma, I. I just found that I was setting my ways on my private land and also I wasn't wanting to, go in there and leave a bunch of scent really dissecting it. Like I had just done Nebraska and so I turned to the public land and so went out there.

I think I told, yeah, I know I told the story on the podcast. It was it was like mid-October. Went up there to hunt. The wind wasn't right for any of my stands, and so I went to. A piece of public that I had scattered quite a bit, actually been on several times. I'd hung two or three cameras on it in the past, and when I got there, it was actually closed for a controlled hunt.

And so just like in Nebraska, when I went to a place I'd never stepped foot on, I basically did the same thing I got on Onyx. I found the next closest piece of [00:18:00] public. Drove there, had never stepped foot on it. I just got outta my truck, started walking and looking for deer sign and found deer trails, found an old scrapes, found old rubs.

Found a spot where acorns were falling and there were some deer poops. So I set up, ended up seeing, I think three doughs that evening, and it just confirmed that like you can find deer and you can find good places to hunt on public land. And so again, I don't know, just back to the whole tradi like, or sorry, the original question of why I hunt public land.

For me, it, ex it expands your horizon. It gives you other places to hunt. And it also, it just forces you to learn about deer, which is so important. Again, I've talked about in previous episodes, like the place that we sold two years ago or whatever it's been now, I just I had been all over that place.

I had explored it, I had hunted it for years. I had so many cameras. And feeders and tinkered with it so much. Like I just [00:19:00] knew where the deer were going to be and I knew if I took my time hunted smart, I was probably going to kill a deer on that property. Cause I'd done it several years in a row. And when I go and I hunt public land, all that stuff is just out the window and it forces you to truly read sign.

Read terrain, read your maps, and find deer. And so long story short, why do I hunt public land still when I have a good private piece to hunt? It? It's an educational tool for me now, and I really enjoy it and I find myself now. This, like leading into this coming year, like I, I have found myself daydreaming more about hunting public almost than I have hunting in my private, because again, it's just that unknown.

I don't hang a lot of cameras on. Last year, on the, that piece that I was hunting, I think I ended up hanging two cameras. I ended up hunting it. I think I hunted it three or four times. For the most part, left those cameras until the end of the year. [00:20:00] Got, I got one pretty darn good buck, a couple decent bucks.

Not as good as the other piece that I was hunting, but it's a lot less pressured. I didn't get any human pictures. I was very careful about my entry and exit. I was always trying to hide my footsteps and everything, and I never saw any trace of any other hunters and so that's also pretty exciting about it.

So yeah, like I said, it's just, it's very good. And now as I'm getting ready to take these other out-of-state hunts, this year I'm going back to Nebraska, I'm planning to go back to Iowa. If I don't draw Iowa, I'm either going to go back to Nebraska or I might just pick another state and go hunt there.

And so again, like instead of just, on my own property, I'm so reliant on my food plots and on my. Feeders and on my knowledge of the area. But if I go to these other states and these other places, I don't have that same knowledge. And so when I hunt public, it's just an educational tool and it sets me up for success no matter where I go.

Because at the end of the day, whitetails are whitetails [00:21:00] and they're gonna do similar things no matter where in the country are, no matter where. Whitetail room. And so again, I would encourage anybody even, even if you have access to good public, or sorry, private land, even if you're a public land hunter, go somewhere else.

And again, like if you can go to another state, great. But even if you can't just go to the other side of your own state. If you live in Western Oklahoma and go to Eastern, and if you live in Eastern ho Oklahoma, go to Western Oklahoma. Just go somewhere that you're not familiar with. And take a walk and just learn how Whitetail uses the landscape.

Long story short, I think I already said that once, but long story short, why do I hunt public land? I use it as an educational tool because I just love learning about whitetails and how to get them in bow range. So that's my answer. All right, moving right along. Question number four comes from a young man who is new to hunting.

Looking to buy his first deer rifle and wanting to know [00:22:00] what caliber he should get. So right off the bat, I wanna say there are so many calibers out there and it's hard to go wrong with a lot of them, but he's asking my opinion which one I would get. So I'm gonna give it and I'm gonna support it. If it's me and I can only buy one rifle and I need to use it for everything, I absolutely hands down and going.

3 0 8. Again, there's a lot of options out there. I know the six five has been super popular lately. I have a six five. I love shooting it, but as far as hunting goes, I have not been super impressed with its knockdown power. I know there's a bunch of different bullets and super fast and all this, and people are gonna argue with me, but.

Me personally, just haven't been super impressed with it. You got your old school 30 out six and your two 70 great rounds. I've killed a lot of deer at two 70. But the reason I like the 3 0 8, honestly, the biggest reason is because it is also an AR round. The AR [00:23:00] 10 shoots a 3 0 8, which means when times get tough or you have some kind of crazy political thing going on in the world, there are two rounds that they're gonna keep making a bunch of.

2, 2, 3 and 3 0 8. So ammo is not a issue. They also make all kinds of ammo for it. So you can buy like a lighter grain bullet that goes faster if you're hunting Smaller stuff. You can buy a larger grain bullet if you're hunting bigger stuff. It's just a good all around round and again, ammo. You can always find it pretty much, it's cheap.

You can buy cheap stuff, you can buy nice stuff, and it's gonna have plenty of knockdown power for whitetails hogs. Coyotes, whatever you wanna shoot in our area, or if you get a little bit older, you want to go explore a little bit and go on a elk hunt, something like that. Plenty of take down power for an elk, mule, deer, whatever you want.

So if I'm only choosing one rifle, I'm choosing a 3 0 8. All right. Question number five is tree stand [00:24:00] locations for private land in southeast Oklahoma or cattle country. So we've covered cattle a little bit with the feeder pins and everything like that, but just some good general rules. One thing that cattle make really tough is hunting like

Field edges, because a lot of times the cows are gonna be out there early in the morning, out in the pasture, eating and everything. And then as soon as it gets hot, they're just gonna walk to the closest trees and just sit there for the majority of the day in the shade. And so a lot of times those field edges just aren't gonna be very good because there's either cows there then, or it's all, knocked down, cleaned out.

But a lot of times you just have to go a little deeper. And those cows, they usually don't go deep into the timber or anything like that. They're just kinda on that edge. And and. Yeah, you just gotta get away from the edge a little bit. And then a good just kind of overall strategy that I've found in southeastern Oklahoma.

I love hunting creeks, on the edge of a creek, and my absolute favorite is finding a creek that runs east West, if possible. Or just finding a section of the [00:25:00] creek that runs east west and you just wanna look for trails, scout, do a little bit of scouting and figure out which side of the creek the deer like to be on a lot of times.

They're gonna favor one side or the other because of some terrain feature or wind or food source or something like that. So a lot of times you're gonna find a lot more sign on one side of the creek than the other. So once you figure out which side of the creek that you want to be hunting on, That's where the wind comes into play.

So let's say the deer like to be on the north side of the creek. I'm gonna hang a stand right on the creek on the north side of it, and I'm gonna hunt that stand on north winds so the wind is going or coming from away from the creek. Blowing over me and then to the other side of the creek, and I'm gonna approach that stand from the south.

So you approach from the south, you cross the creek and immediately climb up into your stand. And you got a great spot as those deer travel back and forth along that creek. Going from one place to the other. And so I've had a lot [00:26:00] of success on our other property, we just so happened to have a creek on each side of the property and there was a perfect spot on each side where the creek turned east and west.

And I had a lot of success on both of those areas because I would always enter an exit from the other side of the creek where the deer just didn't spend as much time. It helped with the wind. The wind would always come, from the up wind side, past me across the creek, and the deer just didn't go back there.

So it helped me not be winded. That creek is also good to just help control your scent, especially in the evening as things cool down, your scent is gonna travel down to that creek and just follow it whichever way the creek is running and flowing and it just helps get that scent out of the area and away from you.

So that's my go-to strategy. I love hunting right on the borders of creeks. Anytime you can find any kind of, terrain feature obviously is gonna be good. A saddle, something like that. Changes in habitat type, if you got like a swampy area, getting right on the edge of that swamp and the hardwoods is usually good.

Any little thing like that is really gonna help out. Like I [00:27:00] said, whether you're in cattle country or not, those are good. Some good stand locations, and I think we've covered cows quite a bit with the feeders and the field edges and everything. Like I said, a lot of times if you have cows, you just gotta go a little bit deeper.

Question six. This one's a fun one. Just fun for me, money being no object. What is one hunt you would like to do? This one is pretty easy for me. Hands down. If money was no object, I would go on a true Alaskan moose hunt. Way back in the bush, Argo base camp type thing. Jim Shockey type stuff.

Where just you got these huge, crazy giant moose that have never seen a human. You're in a crazy, rough environment. The weather's out to get ya. Just, it just, it's like an adventure hunt. You also just have this huge animal that you're hunting. You get a huge trophy. And and again, I was talking about experiences earlier, just the whole experience.

Absolutely. An Alaskan moose hunt. I really don't know anybody who's done a [00:28:00] hunt like that. I do have an uncle who killed a moose probably 20 years ago. But it wasn't like a crazy, backwards type hunt. He stated a nice lodge and everything like that. And that's not the moose hunt I want.

I know that kind of sounds nice. But like I said, I want that true immersed in nature. Crazy backwoods out in the middle of nowhere, moose hunt. A float trip could also be cool. I know that's much more affordable. Where they drop you off and you have rafts and stuff and you get to hunt and float down and hunt.

You get to cover a lot more ground, I think that way. But again, if money's no object I think that's the cheaper route. I think I'd rather go full on guided. And float plane, all that cool stuff. So money is no option. I'm going moose hunting. Moving right along here. Question seven.

Nice, easy, simple question here. What do you plant in your food plots? So this is my first year doing a spring plot. I've tried some in the past, but it was, they were all just halfway done and never really put a bunch of effort into it. So this is my [00:29:00] first real attempt at a spring plot and I just went straight soybeans.

Yeah, you can get some more diversity. It's a lot more hard to get diversity in the spring just cuz there's not quite as many plants that grow well together in the spring. And so I've always wanted to do a corn plot, but we just have too many hogs where I am. And I don't wanna waste my money planting a bunch of corn seed and then, the hogs just come destroy it.

Corn is also much harder to grow. Like it's hard to do that with just like a no-till drill or broadcast. You really need like a corn planter to plant corn, which I don't have. And so between those two things, I've never really tried corn, but like I said, this year I am planting soybeans or did plant soybeans for the first time.

And so sprayed cleared the ground and everything like that, no-till drilled soybeans in. I think I mentioned this when I talked about it on the podcast. I covered every other hole on the on the drill because it was set at seven and a half inch spacing. So I just taped over every other hole to give me 15 inch spacing [00:30:00] to spread those plants out a little bit.

If you wanted to do 'em on seven and a half inch centers, you could but like a lot of commercial farmers, they're doing, 15 and some even do it on 30 inch centers. And so I just think having a little bit more space is good. So I went ahead and covered every other one. And then when it comes to fall plots, there are so many things you can do and you really just have to find what works for you.

If you're, doing a smaller plot, like a quarter to half acre, honestly, the best thing you can probably do is just go buy a mix, from the hardware store or feed store, wherever. Cuz a lot of those now are coming with really good mixes. Most of 'em are gonna have wheat or oats as the main deal, and then they're gonna have.

Turnips vets radishes, who knows All, kale. I think a lot of people are putting kale in those now. And so if you're just doing like a one smaller plot, I think that's definitely the simplest and easiest way to go. Cause it's gonna give you a lot of variety. So for me, I'm planning, right now I'm planning about six acres of [00:31:00] food plots every year.

And I don't wanna spend a whole bunch of money buying, $40 quarter acre bags in, trying to get a full six acres out of that. And so what I've started doing, A lot of times for the ranch, we end up buying either wheats or oats or rye or something like that to plant for the cattle for fall grazing.

And so a lot of times I just steal some of that from from the ranch to use for my food plots and then just add in some mixers. And so I'll go buy like a quarter acre. Canister of, a hundred percent turnips, and then I'll buy another one of all radishes, and then instead of just planting all of those on one quarter acre, I just mix it in with the wheats and oats and all that.

Whatever I'm planning. So it just spreads it out throughout the plot. And yeah, anything good like that? Again, it's hard to go wrong with wheat. Oats are really good. I've found that deer don't like oats quite as much as wheat. If you're just talking about the taste. But they actually grow better than wheat does.

They're a little bit more [00:32:00] frost tolerant. Basically, even if you have a frost, if it warms up again, it'll continue to grow. It's very gras tolerant and honestly, mixing those two is a great idea. So then you kinda have the attraction of the wheat and then the benefit of the oats.

Anytime you're diversifying your fall food plot, it's a good thing. So for me, it changes a little bit every year, but usually it's some kind of cereal grain, either wheat, oats, or rye. And then the rest, I'm just mixing all kinds of stuff in there. Usually, almost always I do turnips and radish. I think last year I bought some rape and some sugar beets.

Yeah, whatever you wanna throw in there is usually good. And food plot mixes are good because, they're tailored to hunters and everything like that. But again, it's very expensive. Like you can go buy a hundred pounds of wheat for the same price as one of those little bitty quarter acre bags that you find at the stores most of the time.

And yeah, basically just don't be fooled by the marketing like deer. If you have a good food source, and by that basically anything but woody brows [00:33:00] and stuff like that, and deer's still gonna eat that woody browse, but just anything that's out of the ordinary that's a good thing to plant.

One thing that you always gotta keep in mind too is look at your neighbors. If your neighbor has 300 acres of wheat, don't plant wheat. Give them something else. The turnips, the radishes, oats just something because deer are. I don't know what's a good word for it.

They're pickers, they eat a little bit of this and then they go somewhere else and they eat a little bit of that. And so just having a variety is always a good thing. So yeah, change it up a little bit every year and but that's what I plant in my food plots. All right, I'm losing count, but I think this is either question six or seven, wherever we're at now.

And it is. What are your plans this season out of state trips? I'll probably end up doing I don't know about a whole podcast, but a pretty good chunk of a podcast coming up on my plans, but I'll go ahead and touch on it right now cuz I have quite a few of 'em at least roughly planned. So September 1st, I plan to be in Nebraska.

They have a September [00:34:00] 1st opener. I went up there last year. For those of you who maybe this is your first time listening. My sister moved to Nebraska last year and the family that she married into has a bunch of farm ground. So went up there, did some Turkey hunting slash scouting for deer season.

When I went last year I had never stepped foot on the property. I really didn't have any idea what to expect when I got there. The main property that I planned on hunting, I found out that my sister's brother-in-law had a dirt bike track on, so that kind of messed with the plan, but I also learned while I was there, That I could pretty easily get access on all the neighbors also because my or her father-in-law has born and raised there, knows everybody for miles around.

And so I got some permission on some neighbors and things like that. And so this year going in much more prepared, I have some more land to hunt. I've done some scouting. I've, walked and gotten familiar with some of this stuff, so I wouldn't say, I know. Know it like the back of my hand or anything like that, but I'm much more familiar with the area.

[00:35:00] When I went up and did my Turkey hunt, I took a couple cheap trail cameras with me. So I think I have three trail cameras out three different properties. And so I don't know how much those trail cameras are gonna help me, kill a deer while I'm there, but they'll at least give me an idea of the caliber of deer that I should expect.

Whether I should choose the first two year old that comes along, or if I hold, should hold out for something more. I had one camera out there last year and actually got some pretty good bucks, but while I was there during Turkey season, I found. Two or No, I found three Deadheads and I was talking to my sister's father-in-law and I was asking him if it had been real dry, and he said it had, so I'm thinking they got hit by E H D and so not sure how that's gonna play into it this year but yeah, so September 1st, I'll be in Nebraska.

October 1st opening day. Probably gonna be somewhere in Oklahoma, not sure yet. And then be in Oklahoma all of October. November's gonna get a little bit hectic the first weekend of [00:36:00] October, or I'm sorry, first weekend of November is always the Texas rifle opener. And I usually go out to my buddy's place in West Texas.

A group of us get together out there and hunt his lease, and so more than likely I'll be there. And then I just actually put in for my Iowa Deer tag. And so if I draw Iowa, I am going to Iowa sometime in November. I'm not sure yet. Luckily with my job I can be a little bit flexible with dates, and so I'm thinking about just giving my boss like a, Hey, sometime in this timeframe I'm gonna be gone.

And then as it gets closer and I can get some weather reports and stuff, I might be able to shift a little bit. Somewhere in that second to third week of November, I'll be headed to Iowa. So definitely looking forward to that. If I were to not draw Iowa, I still want to go on some kind of trip.

If I'm not successful in Nebraska, I could maybe go back there for a couple days. I thought about maybe just switching it up and going to a different part of Oklahoma, hunting some public land. I probably won't [00:37:00] spend the money to buy another out-of-state tag somewhere missouri or wherever just don't need to spend any more money on tags this year.

So yeah I do want to go on some other trip, whether I draw or if I don't draw Iowa. So yeah, other than that, lots of Oklahoma hunting hopefully. I have a, an open invitation to my buddy's place in Texas, so I'm calling this the year of the whitetail. So I'll be hunting Nebraska, hopefully Iowa.

Oklahoma and Texas this year. All for Whitetails. Not doing any western big game elk or anything like that. I'm not gonna lie, after getting my truck and all my gear stolen on my elk hunt last year, I put a little bit of a sour taste in my mouth for going west. I'm sure I'll go back at some point. I still really wanna kill a elk mule deer's also on the list, but I don't know for some reason, like I talked about earlier, just.

As I've gotten older, I just really enjoy hunting whitetails and so yeah. As far as my hunt plans this year, that's a rough outline of where I'll be four states, all for whitetail, [00:38:00] and I'm very super excited about it. You have the right to the best wireless service. Bravado Wireless provides the best mobile, wireless, high-speed internet, latest devices and customer service at prices.

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Bravado, wireless, the power of connection. All right. I got time for one last question to close us out here, and I saved this one for last. This one comes from my Sportsman's Empire, brother Mitch from Pennsylvania. Also, if you guys missed it, I was on Mitch's podcast, I believe last week, the Pennsylvania Woodman, so be sure to check that out.

We had a awesome conversation. Anyway, Mitch messaged me and sent me this question. How has [00:39:00] your drive motivation and goals changed throughout your hunting years to the point you are now? Really good question. One that made me really sit back and think and contemplate a lot. If I go back to when I first started hunting again, didn't grow up in a hunting family, didn't really have access to good hunting ground or anything like that.

And I just wanted to kill a deer. But I had really bad motivation, if I'm being completely honest. When I started out g didn't really have anybody close to me that hunted or to show me the way. So I found a lot of my knowledge and motivation from hunting television, which is honestly not a great spot to get it if you're, a young person.

And so I'm watching these. Guys and gals hunt, super nice private ground killing all these monster bucks. And that's what I thought deer hunting was. And so when I did get to start hunting a little bit, I was, out for the giant, nice 10 point walking slowly [00:40:00] through a field. And that's just not how things go.

And I ended up killing my first deer when I was 15. A buddy of mine from church gave me a ride out to my uncle's place and just got super lucky. Ended up killing this like two year old seven point and I'm not gonna lie, like when I got up to it, I was ecstatic, but there was definitely a little part of me that was like, I.

Man, this deer isn't as big as those bucks on tv. And I hate that. Like I absolutely hate that, but that's just how I felt because that's the only thing I had to compare it to. And from that point on I was like, all right, I want a bigger buck. And so the next bu buck I killed was also a two year old, was a little bit bigger, eight point.

And then the next year I killed was like a three year old nine point and on and on, they slowly got bigger And just as it went, my, my goals and motivation changed. At one point I was like, all right, one 30 or nothing, and then I killed that. And so I was like, all right, one 40 or nothing.

And it just kept going up and up. And then in 2017, got super lucky. [00:41:00] Ended up killing a really nice buck, still my biggest buck to date. And and after that I was Now what? Like it's possible for me to kill a buck, like a bigger buck. It wasn't like a 200 inch deer or anything like that.

In fact, the opposite. I think I've told people before, I sent a picture to a couple buddies and a couple of 'em were like, man, buck of a lifetime. And I was like I sure hope not. Like I hope I kill a bigger buck. But that's not necessarily my goal or my motivation these days, now that I'm getting a little older, now that I have a daughter and hunting time's a little bit more precious.

It's much less about the headgear the score, the size of the antlers, and so much more about the experience. And like when, you know what I was talking about earlier with the public land and everything, like for me, killing a big buck is great. And yes, I still try to kill a giant buck every year, but it's not just the size of the antler.

It's like I want the whole deal because. I've just, I've killed enough deer now and I've [00:42:00] learned to really appreciate the moment. And, the, this buck that I killed this last year with my bow, he came charging in. There was two other bucks with him. There was two or three doughs out there.

Deer were scattering everywhere. It was late season. He was facing me. I drew my bow and he just kept facing me and I had to let down. And then he turned and I drew again. And he st, put that foot forward and gave me a perfect shot. I 12 ringed him. He went down in sight. And like that.

You can probably hear it in my voice like that is what gets me excited and that's why I do all the stuff that I do. That's why I'm planning all these food plots and sweating my, what's off all summer, doing all this prep work and setting up these blinds and hanging tree stands and fighting poison ivy and everything.

I am doing all this work for that one moment, that 10 to 60 seconds where you have that interaction with that mature buck, he's right on top of you. He doesn't know you're there. You're whispering to yourself. Aim low, aimless. Cause I always shoot high, so I'm. I'm constantly whispering that [00:43:00] to myself as he is there.

I'm controlling my breathing. I'm thinking about all these little things that I train myself to think about and contemplate all year long so that when this moment, when this buck is in front of me, I shut everything else out and that's all that I'm concentrating, and that is what I live for nowadays.

That is my motivation. Those are my goals. It's much less, gosh, just much less score oriented. Again, I like, I love shooting big bucks. I'm all about shooting mature bucks, like I'm not gonna kill that three year old. I'm pretty good about not killing four year olds anymore. I'm looking for that five plus.

I've killed several, six, seven, and eight year old deer. Just very blessed in that regard. And that's what I'm looking for. And I'm looking for going to Nebraska and shoot, I'll kill a th a three year old in Nebraska if he's coming in all bristled up. And I have two days to hunt and he. Finally gives me a shot.

And when I go to Iowa, like I'm I know I'm spoiled in saying this, but I think a lot of people in Oklahoma can [00:44:00] also say this. Just don't tell anybody else. I'm going to Iowa knowing that there's a good chance that I'm not going to kill the biggest buck of my life. But I want to go there and I want to experience that crazy rut when you have a great buck to dough ratio and you got monsters running through the woods everywhere and it's hot and heavy.

And you can rattle. And you can grunt and there's just seven bucks chasing one dough like that is what I'm after. That is the experience in the goal that I'm looking forward to you. Great way. I hope y'all can, hear the excitement and the passion in my voice. That's why I do this. That's why I hunt.

That's why I have this podcast. Cause I love sharing those experiences with other people. Yeah. I hope you guys, ask these questions to yourself. What's your motivation? What's your goals? How has that changed from when you were younger to today? What are you looking forward? To passing on to your kids and that same passion.

Yeah, man, what a great time. I'm all kinds of fired up, but [00:45:00] anyway, I better shut this thing down. I need to get going. Thank you guys for all your questions. I hope you guys enjoyed this podcast. I'm not gonna do a separate outro, I'm just gonna end it right here. So I hope you guys have a great week.

Thank you guys for supporting the Oklahoma Outdoors Podcast and until next week. I will see you guys right back here.

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