Cell Cam Discussion with Cameron Deerfield

In this episode of the Whitetail Experience Podcast, Byron Horton and Cam Deerfield discuss cell cams and the future of deer hunting.  This is still has a BS session vibe but two guys discuss the pros and cons on the technology in the sport.  There are still some laughs and good points made but main focus on cell cams and if they are too much technology for hunting and if they are fair chase.

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Byron Horton: All right. This is the Whitetail Experience Podcast bonus episode coming in this week with Mr. Cameron Deerfield. If you caught the BS session early in the week, had a few laughs, some good deer talk, I felt, and again, we did this in person.

This is a little more centered around the cell cam discussion and.

Cam Deerfield: I, I'd say

Byron Horton: he does a really good job of, of remaining neutral and kind of maybe steering me off of, uh, my rocker. Cause everyone knows how I feel about the, the cell cam thing. . Um, have you caught the episode with Dan? I did, uh, on [00:01:00] his podcast not too long ago.

I got a little heated, uh, but this one's a little more neutral as far as both guys hate. , um, you're in two different camps and, and that's allowed to be. But, uh, I, I appreciate Cam, uh, oh, discussing this with me and, and like I said, it, it was a good time. I, I had some laughs when I was over there. We drank some beers and it was, it was solid evening of podcasting.

All right, let's let it rip. Okay. I think we are running. Yes. Okay. So today's podcast, I am on location, which, uh, you might be the first. Guy I've gone to podcast with at, uh, residence and, and you know, we have a pretty good podcast studio. We got a lot of dead deer on the wall. We got a lot of sheds.

Cam Deerfield: Well, it probably helps.

I'm eight

Byron Horton: minutes away. Yeah, yeah, that is true. He's like, Hey, I'm, I'm 10 minutes down the road. Uh, let's do this in person. Um, Canberra. Deerfield, why don't you give us a, a 32nd, one minute quick intro. Uh, for the folks that don't know you, you are a local Ohio bow.

Cam Deerfield: Yeah, I, uh, I wouldn't just classify myself [00:02:00] as a bow hunter.

I'm just a deer hunter. I, uh, I shoot deer with guns, bows, whatever is legal. I, uh, I just like chasing big deer. I like chasing public land, deer. I like chasing private land deer. I just, uh, I, I enjoy the art of finding big deer and, uh, just enjoy myself out there. Um, I honestly like the older I get, I like, I like, I like shed hunting more than I do actually deer hunting.

But I've been very fortunate throughout my hunting career and I've shot some decent deer and. That's kind of gave me, gave me somewhat of a little name for myself that I, uh, can kill at least 140 inch deer. Yeah.

Byron Horton: You killed a lot of, uh, a couple like, um, giants. Absolute giants. Right. Well, you, you and I are within striking distance of age.

Yeah. And, uh, your wall is much bigger and, and pronounced, if you will. So, so I'm gonna, I'm, I'm gonna, but all that comes outta price.

Cam Deerfield: Sure,

Byron Horton: sure. Mm-hmm. , and, uh, you've done some outfitting, you've done some stick bow hunting. So, so, um, a wide variety of time in the.

Cam Deerfield: Yeah, I've pretty, I pretty much devoted my life too.

Like I, I dropped outta high school to deer hunt. I've quit every job I've ever had to [00:03:00] deer hunt. Uh, it's just, uh, I, but it comes outta cost. You know, you, you, you miss out on family time. You miss out on a lot of stuff. Yeah. Uh, to have a wall that I have is, is cool, but it's, uh, it comes, it comes with a, with a price, you know?

And that's kind of why I stand the way I do with the industry and everything. Yeah. Now, you know what

Byron Horton: I mean? Yeah. And so I had, I had the debate, this. And I have stayed kind of quiet on the cell cam topic and, and, uh, maybe it was, uh, a hunt I had experience with that kind of gave me a bad taste. But, and then I said, you know, like, I see these guys and, and they don't speak up for what they believe in sometimes, right?

Because they uh mm-hmm. , they don't, they don't wanna be a bad guy. Mm-hmm. . And I was like, you know, this is kind of bothering me. And I started posting some of these memes around cell cams and is this fair chase? And, uh, posting some examples that were, We're very borderline to too cringey, right? Mm-hmm. , like, like I, yeah, we won't get into 'em, but like, and you're like, Hey, like, I think you're also somewhat disrespecting guys [00:04:00] that would kill big Deer on a regular basis.

And I said, you know, that's a, that's a valid point. Like, I don't wanna, I don't wanna be that, but I do. I am scared to wear, it's going. And obviously at ATA now, the live feature, that's a right. That's like, oh wow. Like that, some of that technology I was speaking about, people were like, oh, that's not coming this, well, it's here.

Yeah, no, it

Cam Deerfield: is. So, but it's like a technology is something that we've all depended on our entire hunting career. We grew up in the era of technology hunting.

Byron Horton: Yeah. So like the dudes from like the, the nineties ish, uh, and prior. Oh man, they, they would have a field day

Cam Deerfield: with us. Well, you know, so that's some of the advantages the to tech too.

The whole technology thing and trail cameras, like, one thing that I will argue about cell cameras or trail cameras in general is what we've seen over the last 20 years in deer hunting is, , the class of deer go up. Sure. The maturity of deer go up. The ma the class of deer in areas go up because people know what's in the area now, so they're not gonna shoot a [00:05:00] three year old knowing there's a five year old, a hundred hundred 80 inch deer there.

So there has been, there's been benefits to it. Yeah. You know, so it's like, I feel like there's so much negativity surrounding the cell camera thing right now. Like, let's talk about the benefits. Sure, sure. Because it, it has benefited us all as, in a way of like, there's more people passing smaller deer.

Sure.

Byron Horton: And, and like my stance was, I feel the, the ability to swipe your phone and be getting the information from multiple locations with mm-hmm. with the zero disturbance. Yeah. That, that to me is kind of, , my, my, my big negative and, and I, I'm afraid that because those guys have spent no time in the woods, like that's a pretty good advantage for not doing what I feel like is the craft, if you will,

Cam Deerfield: per se.

But in order to find a big deer, you gotta find a big deer. No matter if you have a cell camera, a conventional camera, or no cameras. So in order to put the work in to find that deer, the, [00:06:00] it doesn't matter if you have a cell camera or not. What that cell camera's allowing you to do is do things that you couldn't do.

Otherwise, like for instance, if you're at home and it's eight o'clock at night and you're sitting there reading your daughter a, a, a book and you know, a cam or a a a a picture comes up. Okay, well, at least I know the class of deer that I want to chase is in this area, so I'm not wasting my time. That doesn't necessarily mean you're killing that deer.

Mm-hmm. . Um, I run 58, 58 cell, uh, uh, cell cams throughout the season. I have 300 cameras.

If I could kill every deer I have on cell camera man, . You know what I mean? I would, I'd be, I'd be one bad mofo. Yeah. But it's not gonna happen. And the argument behind the cell camera was like this one guy that gets a picture of a deer and he walks out back of his house and he shoots it. Like, okay, let's really break this down.

You're talking about one guy, like one hour kill, but you're talking about one guy that just so happens to live on the farm that he daddy hunts. [00:07:00] And then. On top of that, it just so happens to be during gun week. Mm-hmm. , on top of that, it just so happens to be a daylight picture. On top of that, he just so happens to be home from work.

On top of that, he is able to walk out and shoot this deer. Mm-hmm. , he's gonna have a lot of things lined that's less than 1% of people.

Byron Horton: So, um, that technology allows that to happen. Sure. I guess the thing for me that I, um, I have seen right, is. the ability to like not step in the woods and have a very good starting point.

Okay. That, that to me is like, a lot of people are concerned about the 1224 hour kills, right? Mm-hmm. like where, okay, the buck was, was looped this particular scrape at night. Two days later, there's a cold front, there's a rain stoppage. Like chances are that's a good scrape to go hunt and they, they

Cam Deerfield: maybe pull it off.

Maybe they don't. So what about the guy that went and checked his camera two, two days before that cold front hit? Sure. So, you know what I mean? He's gonna have the same a. , [00:08:00] but you know what, the only difference in that is, is time. So that that gentleman has more time to be in the field.

Byron Horton: Correct. He did save time, but like on that walk in, he could have bumped the deer.

The deer could have seen him hurt

Cam Deerfield: him. Anybody could have done that though. Sure. Especially if he's on camera and your chances of bumping him is even higher.

Byron Horton: Yeah. So I have the debate too, of like if I go hunt a great, I don't know if I wanna pull the camera before the hunt sometimes, because I don't want that ground set.

In the potential standing point of a buck. Right. Perhaps there, there, there is a plus minus like, oh, I gained intel of,

Cam Deerfield: but that's, that all comes down to how you set your cameras.

Byron Horton: Sure. Is it far enough back? Is the wind wind doing whatever?

Cam Deerfield: Is it, is it 12 feet up a tree? Yeah. Can I, and can I climb it with my climate sticks and not interfere with what he's gonna do?

He's probably gonna come from downwind. Yeah. So don't walk on the downwind

Byron Horton: side of your scrape. Yeah. And I, so for me it's. , uh, I, I err on the side of caution a lot of times, whether

Cam Deerfield: that's good or bad. As, as whitetail hunters, you should,

Byron Horton: you know, but that to me is like the, the, the [00:09:00] difference. And, and then obviously you multiply it out.

If that individual has say, 15 camps before that cold front rain stop, he can, he can pick what he thinks is the most killable, whether it happens or

Cam Deerfield: not. There, there's, so you, you hunt a lot of the same terrain that I, I, that. and as far as like southern O, you know, southern part of the state, it's it's hill country.

Do you really think if you gotta a cell championship buck that you could walk up on him and kill

Byron Horton: him? That like within an hour kind of thing?

Cam Deerfield: Within an hour kind of thing?

Byron Horton: I like my chances more in this scenario we just described where he's been active on a certain scrape and I could kill him maybe two or three days later when late October, that that front comes.

but like an individual picture of him moving through like a, let's say a, a trail on a train or just on a hillside. Mm-hmm. .

Cam Deerfield: See, and that's the thing. Yeah. So it's like you, us as, especially the bus, right? Us, us as public land hunters, where we [00:10:00] walk two, three miles back and we, and we set a camera, we might not wanna walk in there four times a summer.

So you put a cell camera back there to save yourself because you don't like, what's the, what's the end goal? What's the reason we're going out and scouting every weekend? What's the reason we're taking time away from our family? Yeah. What's the reason we're down there all November to shoot a big deer.

Mm-hmm. . That's what this entire industry is based off of shooting big

Byron Horton: deer. Yeah. And, and I talked about that. Is that kind of a, you know, the, is that the dagger that's driving some

Cam Deerfield: of this? per se. It is, you know, but like, so you got guys who kill big deer because it's cool to kill big deer and you got guys who kill Big Deer cuz they're passionate about killing big deer.

And there's a, you can definitely watch a guy's social media, watch how he acts, his reactions to things and tell who, what the difference is. Mm-hmm. , there's guys that do it, that go to outfitters every year that shoot 170 inch deer. There's guys that never been to an outfitter in their life that shoot a hundred 70th year every year.

There's a definitive difference between those. , you know what I mean?

Byron Horton: Okay. So we talk about the camera that's two miles back in some sort of, uh, system. And I guess my, my thing is right, [00:11:00] by putting that camera there, you're putting it, you know, they tell you to put the cell cams in the areas you do not want to disturb.

Right. The areas that are, uh, very intrusive to hunt and scout mm-hmm. to me is that bypassing some of these whitetails defense. Right, because that whitetail has figured out that, hey, back in that particular system, it's a little more advantageous to live. I don't get as much hunting pressure back in there potentially, but we all know that as deer hunters.

Sure, sure, sure. But like, I definitely feel that some of these like, um, tippy toe type areas where you don't want to go in a. , those deers start to move a little bit and the cell cam tells you, okay, now is your drone strike. Now is your best percent to drone strike. Nothing is guaranteed, but he gives you that.

Okay. He's moved in daylight one time in that far back system and, uh, you know, now it's time to, he, he's, he's starting to get stupid,

Cam Deerfield: if you will. [00:12:00] Uh, the best term I've ever heard, I've ever heard when it comes to killing big deer is, uh, big Deer will tell you when they're, when they're ready to die. I like,

And that's the truth. Uh, killing big deer isn't hard. Finding big deer is the hardest part. Yes. And anybody will tell you that. So if you already know where a big deer is, you'll probably have enough witch to you that you could kill that deer without the camera. That camera just reassuring you what? That he's there.

You're still gonna hunt there, whether that camera was there or not. If you fill in your heart, if you fill enough in your heart to put a camera in there, you're gonna hunt it. Yeah. Plain it simple. We all, we all know as deer hunters, , we've, a lot of us have killed deer that weren't on camera. Yeah. That were in the areas that we knew.

They they were. They were

Byron Horton: there. Yeah. But, okay, so, so you have several of these, like hard to get two spots. You're gonna hunt the one that has the

Cam Deerfield: pictures, depending on your wind, depending on access. Sure. Depending on the time of season, depending on food sources, depending on where you think he's vetted.

If he's vetted in [00:13:00] the wrong spot, why would you? There. Yeah, I agree. But so like that camera only tells you he's there. Yeah. You're just reassuring what you already knew. Yeah. But if I have

Byron Horton: two or three, four hub systems mm-hmm. , right? Ridge's fingers, right. They're, they're these both suck to get to. This one has two bucks that I'd like to shoot.

Starting to be daylight my Saturday morning. I need to be there scouting towards that area, hunting that. Skying if, but, but I've, I, I've, I got my starting point much more advantageous cuz I've got the text. Can

Cam Deerfield: I be honest with you? Yeah. I think a conventional camera is much easier to hunt. . You wanna know why?

Because I gotta go in there three to four times a summer. Right. So if I access differently each, uh, you know, when I go in to check my camera, if I access differently than what I'm gonna hunt mm-hmm. , he's gonna adapt the way that I access to check my camera. So if I get him betting to access the way I check my camera and I go in the hunting from a different way.

I've already got him. I just, I knew the deer was there that I thought was there. That's the only thing the camera's doing. Yeah. That's what the cell camera's doing. Yeah. And the same [00:14:00] sense of I know he is there. He knows that camera. We all know big mature deer know where cameras are. They know what a camera is.

They've all been shot at, they've been shot at on corn piles. They know what a corn pile is. There's not a single deer in this state that hasn't ate from a corn pile . You know what I mean? It's just, that's facts. I mean, you, you, you hunt public enough to. As, as as I do, we found corn piles on public. Oh

Byron Horton: wait, now, uh, what is it, two out of four properties that butt up to 'em have a feeder.

Yeah.

Cam Deerfield: You know, and so it's like, and those guys, the guys, the properties that butt up the public have corn on public. Okay. Most of the time. You know, so you're finding out that these deer aren't killable, just cuz they're on camera. Like it takes somewhat of a skill to actually kill. He's on camera in that spot because it's at his advantage to be in that.

It's not, it's your advantage to be at that spot. That's why you got a camera there. That's the difference between, between shooting good deer and mature deer. You're putting your camera where you can't be. You just want to know that he's there and, and don't

Byron Horton: want to be

Cam Deerfield: when the time's wrong. [00:15:00] Right. Or when the time's Right.

You don't want to be there cuz you know you can't be there cuz you know why he's there. The thermals are working in his favor. The wind's in his favor. The reason that he's there is cuz he can be there and be safe. You don't want to be there. Yeah. You want to catch him coming to a place where you can harvest that animal.

Yeah.

Byron Horton: And like. That, and that's why like, I'm like the undisturbed side of the cell cam thing bothers me. Right. Um, and like the multiplication out, uh, uh, of, of being so many places at one time. Yeah. Because like, I, I, I did a, I. You and I, what, what can we, we can't really quantify the undisturbed factor, right?

Mm-hmm. , I, I give that somewhere between a times two to times 10. Mm-hmm. , and that probably depends on the set, the farm, the, the deer themselves. But for, I, I, you look at a camera 15 minutes down the road, it's gonna take you 15 to drive, 15 to walk. Quad runner in there or whatever. 15 minutes back home.

You're, you're talking an hour. Yeah. For one camera. If you pull up your app, [00:16:00] dial to that camera, we'll, we'll say that takes a minute. Mm. that is a, for one camera that is a 6000% increase in a 24 hour period. So as, as far as a efficiency.

Cam Deerfield: Okay, I get that. But then, but the only thing stopping you from doing that is spending money.

Correct. And that's kind of where I'm, it's no different than sitting on. , a biologic plot and a 360 blind, that's completely scent proof and you're shooting deer at 15 yards. Yeah. That and that, and that is money will get you that. Yeah. And you can do that anywhere in the country. You could do that on public if they would allow you to do it.

You know what I mean? Yeah. It's just, uh, using what's what you have in your tool belt to harvest them much. Your animal doesn't, does it make you a better hunter? No, it doesn't. It just reassures you that you are learning and you are like, if, if you think there's a big deer in this area, that camera's just letting you know.

Okay. You. . Okay. That doesn't mean you're gonna harvest that

Byron Horton: animal. See, I look at you, multiply it out, right? We just did one camera, 6000% increase. And that's why I'm like, maybe [00:17:00] this technology

Cam Deerfield: we need to look at, because a 6000% increase on what, though? On

Byron Horton: one camera for one day. Now multiply that out every 24 hours because

Cam Deerfield: you didn't, yeah.

But a picture's like a picture doesn't mean a dead deer though. Yeah, it doesn't. It doesn't. And, but honestly, it would scare me if I, if I had a picture and I, and I walked in there being a public land. If I had him on camera at three o'clock and I'm walking in there at five, that's scary. I don't know where the fuck he's at.

He could be anywhere in that area. See, I'm

Byron Horton: like, I'm, I gotta be close,

Cam Deerfield: right? No, yeah. But you, but you don't wanna be, you don't know how close you are. Yeah. You could go in there for no reason.

Byron Horton: See, I, I, I, I'm, I'm thinking that's more of a positive. Like, he's close.

Cam Deerfield: If I, if I, my two biggest deer, I killed them Where they, where they weren't at for the last five days.

Okay. They were

Byron Horton: coming back or,

Cam Deerfield: yeah. Okay. And once you learned that pattern of where they, where they're. , that's that step ahead. I missed

Byron Horton: my window today, uh, this year on a buck that, uh, I ha I have a, a video of him leaving the farm with the death. Yeah. I hunt the farm really hard. My, my small piece, [00:18:00] the next picture I got him was like the 28th of November.

He came back. Yeah. Uh, but

Cam Deerfield: anyways, um, but the fact is like, okay, so if you're a guy who works all summer and doesn't have to work in the fall, and you're sitting in your tree stand every single day of the season and you just happen to harvest, Okay, so is that, is that a unfair advantage?

Byron Horton: No, but to me that also brings it back to, to, to hunting.

Right. And I look at hunting as this heritage, as this primal activity as this sport. Mm-hmm. and I'm, I'm looking at the technology we're advancing in at a very rapid rate right now. And like a little bit of concern for my son and what hunting is gonna look like and what this, this ability to actively be so many places at one.

because I know guys now that instead of having two leases have three. My outfitting buddy, he fired, uh, he didn't fire, but he's like, Hey, I, I don't need my part-time help. So he's, he's saving money there. He bought obviously some, some more [00:19:00] stuff for his farm, but also bought a 50 acre piece. Yeah. That, that came up for sale on the road.

Because my concern for the future, right, is the active ability to scout multiple locations. , it does favor the guy with the cash and because he was restricted prior by time. But those

Cam Deerfield: guys with cash can't take public away. They can't. And that's what it all comes down to. Like we can talk private all day, but you, you can admit, and I can admit, and anybody who's really hunted public hard and hunted private hard, I'd rather hunt public 10, 10 times out of nine, nine out 10 times.

I'd rather hump hump post some places that pressure that public or that private land's. . Okay. Because the way the, the times we live in, the times we live in private, any private that I'm gonna get, I'm not paying for. Mm-hmm. , I mean, I do have leases outta state, but like in this state, I'm not paying for it.

Yeah. So it's like, it's gonna be tougher to get, I think. Exactly. It's a, it's a handshake farm. So if I'm shaking your hand to hunt this, there's probably three other guys shaking your hand to hunt this. Yeah. My, uh, two biggest deer, 12 guys had on [00:20:00] camera. Yeah. I, I remember you talked, uh, and it's like, okay, so I'm going in passing a hundred fifties, a hundred sixties, 170 inch deer to shoot 180 some inch deer, knowing 12 guys have 'em.

With no cell cameras. Do you,

Byron Horton: uh, do you have any 2 cents around keeping public land? Maybe like a, a no trail cam, clause like Missouri has, like some of the western states have, because neither so, uh, heat with the most cell cams or the most trail cams, winds keeping public land a little more of an even style playing field.

Does that

Cam Deerfield: ever answer? No. I mean, he, who has the better job? Has the, has the nicer car. What does it matter? Yeah, if you got grit, you got grit. You know what I mean? If you want it bad enough, I don't care if you got three cameras or 300 cameras, you're gonna shoot a big dude. Yeah. So I, I, I mean, are you, should you, should you take guys' money away cuz they have a nice car?

No. Then why would you take their cameras away? Right? But that's, that's their advantage. Okay. They got all money. Find your advantage. Your advantage might be [00:21:00] okay, you might run cameras, but you only hunt 10, 10 days a season. I can hunt 30 days a season,

Byron Horton: but what if you blast the woods with 75 cell? ,

Cam Deerfield: then you blast woods with 75 cell cameras.

Ooh, I do not like that. Okay. But that doesn't mean he's gonna kill. Okay. He gets one tag. Yeah. Let him run 75 cameras. He's got one tag.

So

Byron Horton: to me, that's kind of bypassing the sport, right? Like, I feel like to, to

Cam Deerfield: he had to find those deer, he had to scout to know where to put those cameras. Yeah. He had to put the work in to do that.

So it's not like you just hang a camera and there's a one 60.

Byron Horton: Yeah. But you, you put enough of them and obviously the, the rate of technology. , it's gonna increase. And now like in 10 years, do we have these, these softball size cell cams and, and as some, there's a new cam that pivots

Cam Deerfield: does 360. So let me, let me ask you this.

Yeah. We know how many guys between me and you, would you think we know that hunt public land at least a hundred

Byron Horton: y y maybe, but, but maybe like 20 here in the Buckeye state that I know in a first name

Cam Deerfield: basis. Okay. So how many of those guys kill mature deer every single year on a year to year [00:22:00] basis, no matter what cameras that they use or.

three to five on you? I, I was getting about five-ish. Yeah. Okay. So you don't think any of those guys run conventional cameras? I don't know if I Intel cameras. And you think any of the guys that don't kill Deere don't, don't run cell cameras? I know guys personally that run cell cameras that are supposed to be OG Ohio public land guys that haven't killed a deer.

Really? You know what I mean? That they run cell cameras. Yeah. So it's like, it, the cell camera doesn't matter. At the end of the day. We all know the difference when we're sitting in deer camp, we all know the difference between deer hunters. So, so it's, it's the, the grit doesn't change. Yeah. K killers are gonna kill.

Yeah. And if you do it on a consistent basis, like for, for instance, , you're not known as the Big Deer killer, but you're known as a killer. You killed deer on public land. You've done it on a consistent basis. That's because the work you've put in, right? So if you, if you took one year out of your life and said, okay, I'm not selling for that.

I'm shooting a [00:23:00] one 70. And you literally devoted your, your year to that. Sure. Like, you know what, your dad, I'm draining my 401k, I'm quitting my job, I'm doing whatever. Like you could do it. Those guys that are running those cell cameras just have a different type of grit. Yeah. If they have 75 cameras out there, applaud that dude.

He put out 75 cameras on public. So that like, that's

Byron Horton: where I'm like, that's a

Cam Deerfield: lot of work. You know what I mean? That is a

Byron Horton: ton of work. But, but something about. The ability to, to, to get the text that tells you the most killable deer

Cam Deerfield: and, and the big This cause on camera don't mean it's killable. No, but majority of the pictures you get, like, let's be honest, on public land, you can, and you can attest for this, majority of the pictures you get on public land is during rut time, time period.

Mm-hmm. late, no, late October to mid-November. And actually

Byron Horton: I know people say the Russ not pattern bro. I don't know about you, but I get a, I

hate

Cam Deerfield: to ru that's almost when I, but I, but for a guy who singles out deer, that's hard. for seeing deer, period. Ru's awesome. [00:24:00] Sure. But I get

Byron Horton: almost more 1224 hour loops that are like killable, where like he passed there at, let's call it midnight, then the next 12 hours.

He, he, and if I was gonna hunt that morning and, and I hunt as many days as I can between October 20th and the end of November. like some, sometimes it's like four out of five or or three out

Cam Deerfield: of five. But like, so say that. Say that that guy, so say a guy from Indiana walks into our state, he puts out five cell cameras.

Okay. Say you've been hunting this same piece of public for six years. Mm-hmm. , who has the advantage. Sure you do. But that's also more like norm. So what does that cell camera matter? He's not gonna walk in in hill country and walk up on a deer and shoot him on camera. Hmm. That's not gonna. . You know that's not gonna happen.

You're not walking through the woods and shooting a deer on camera. Not in hill country, not in middle of October when it's dry as fuck. And you sound like you're walking on styrofoam plates. Yeah, yeah. You're not doing it rainy day. [00:25:00] Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. So it's like with a gun. Yeah. But that's a different type of, that's, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, we're talking about a majority of our deer season is bo Is is bow hunting. Now

Byron Horton: Cam, what about some of the cringe stuff where. . I don't know. To me, like what feels very borderline fair chase is the, the Midwest whitetail this year, like guys are, are setting up their evening post, knowing, not knowing, right?

You don't fully know anything, but like, hey, 30 minutes before sunrise this morning, the buck was headed towards this direction. Like mm-hmm. , I know that bedding area is, is, you know, there's a couple favorable sides of bed. I'm gonna hunt this spot on the evening post. , they're doing it based on the text.

Cam Deerfield: Was that any different than the guy went and checked his camera at four in the morning? He, he knew the same thing. Yeah.

Byron Horton: But he physically did it again. He, he, he physically ground, said he's potentially bumping him like [00:26:00] he's, you know, the deer has a chance to get educated on, on the fact he's being pursued.

Cam Deerfield: He knows he's being. you're talking about? Uh, I, I, I'd rather think the other day there's 8 million deer hunters in the country. The next best thing to us is like 4 million people that hunt elk or something like that. Okay. So these deer know they're being hunted. I mean, first off, we're on public land.

Mm-hmm. , you know, as well as I know, we're in the, one of the only states that hold Harbor Giant Whitetails that you can hunt over the counter. Mm-hmm. and you can come here and shoot good deer on public first state to the east, unfortunately. And it's the cheapest state to hunt. God bless it. DNR for crisis, you know, and so it's like, so we deal with more pressure than any, like, Iowa can't even, uh, fathom the pressure that.

Michigan doesn't even understand the pressure that we have. Even though Michigan's a, a high pressure state, they're twice the size of us. So of course they have more hunters per square mile. They're twice the size of us. Yeah. You know, but our state, we get, you can, you can attest on public land. You got people from New Jersey, New Hampshire, North Carolina.

South Carolina

Byron Horton: [00:27:00] City, Florida. We got three big cities, you know, so it's like Cleveland, Cincinnati, and

Cam Deerfield: Columbus. Majority of people in our public land aren't even from here. Yeah, you're not wrong. So you're dealing with guys out there stomping around, beating the hell outta this public land, know nothing about it, never even hunted hill country before.

Yeah. So knowing that, knowing that we have all this pressure, and knowing that there's some killers in this state that hunt public land, there's not a single deer that I've shot off public land that nobody else had on camera. Somebody's messaging me like, Hey, I, I had a picture of that dude. Yeah. Once they, there's enough killers in this state, like there we.

We all live kind of in the same area. So, so that's the thing too. Like we all kind of are in the same

Byron Horton: areas. That kind of bothers me, right? That some of the mystery or like the, the unknown, like if you look at, at, at, at hunting as a pureness, like

Cam Deerfield: you're not gonna shoot a deer up public land right now that not one guy has on camera.

Well, I don't even, I, you

Byron Horton: may, may, you might be able to take public private out of that

Cam Deerfield: conversation. Everybody has at least that deer on camera. One person has that one. Yeah. Like

Byron Horton: maybe like a big landowner in the [00:28:00] western ish states, you know that Correct. That are very vast, but like, I don't know, man. I think, uh, you're right.

I don't think there's a deer in the state that ain't been trail camped.

Cam Deerfield: Yeah. And it's like, that's where, that's the era we live in, so why not adjust to it? Okay. So like my private land, my, my private farm's out of state, we're able to bait. I bait because my neighbors bait. Oh yeah. I have to bait. Yeah. If I don't bait, I don't, I don't have deer.

Yeah. Do I go hunt a bait? do. I like shooting deer off. I've shot two deer off corn my entire life and I felt like garbage . You know what I mean? And it's just like, and it, it wasn't even my, my big deer. It was just like deer that I was just like, man, like I don't even like doing this. But it was like late season and it was fun and you know, yeah.

It's different. Like you have to, like, even in this state, if you have private land, you have to bait almost to have deer because if you're not, everybody else is baiting. Yeah. I can

Byron Horton: think of a, so, so let me ask this. At the rate of technology, , I'm, I I look at what's coming, right? The, the pivoting and zooming of, of, of these trail cams, like the, the live stream of the woods.

[00:29:00] Like, to me it's, it's morphing very much into security guard esque feature. And I do not like that. And I'm a little bit afraid that in five, 10 years, like it's gonna be like, click, click, okay. I've got my, my detail, let me go to thermal mode, and now I can penetrate the

Cam Deerfield: woods at even greater. But it's, yeah.

But aren't you glad that you get to hunt a better class of animal because. the class. Okay, so you take 1995 to 2023 in 1995, how many? 26 point 230 engineer you think were being shot? None. , very rare was that happening. But access, when we was kids, when we was kids, a big gear was a giant six by six, a giant five by five.

But access was a lot easier. So think about how much trail cameras have changed the hunting world and the fact that nobody's shooting small D I'm not saying nobody. Yeah, there's a couple guys out there, but

I'm just saying. I'm just saying like, A whole lot of people are holding out from older class [00:30:00] of deer. Yeah. So in general, across the map, the deer have gotten older, more mature, bigger, and it's just like, , how's that not help the industry? Sure. Is there a downfall to sell cameras? Sure. But it's, I feel like it's less than 1%.

It's that one guy that sits on his farm, but if he can shoot it from, if he can walk to it from his house because he got it on camera, he can probably shoot it from his porch. Mm-hmm. and people's been shoot deer off porch for 200 years. And

Byron Horton: again, like I, you know, a lot of people get caught up in the 12, 24 hour like kills.

Right. And to me, I'm almost more bothered about the guy who blasts the woods with cell cams in, in the. starts his vacation and he's got such a leg up and has spent zero time in the woods. I'm like, wait a minute. So the Woodsmanship right. So the guy who's actually scouting,

Cam Deerfield: like, what do you, what do you take away?

He doesn't have an advantage. What do you take away from the guys that hunt the red moon? Uh, um, you know what I mean? I don't believe in the moon. I don't, when a deer ready dies ready to die, I don't, I don't believe in the moon. But there's guys that go out there and hunt the red moon, like Adam [00:31:00] Hayes and all these guys.

I respect Adam Hayes. I think Adam Hayes is a great. But I'm saying there's guys that live and die by that, that know that if they go out on the red moon, that they're gonna kill deer. Now I think that there's a methodical process behind that. They don't hunt their deer until the red moon, so they're not pressured.

So they go out on the red moon and they kill 'em. Mm-hmm. , you know, so there, there's a lot of, uh, you know, hoopla behind that. Yeah. But what about those guys? Yeah. They have a system down. It's no different than the system of running a, a, a, a cell camera. I'm not gonna go hunt an area that doesn't have a big deer, and you wouldn't either.

If it, if there's a deer there that you don't want to shoot, you're not, you're not gonna hunt it. So, but if you, if you go check your conventional cameras, I say you go check 12 cameras and there's a giant on this camera and there on the other 11 cameras, there's not a giant, what are you, what are you gonna go, what, what area are you gonna focus on?

Uh, yeah, I am, the cell cameras are the same process. You have to put in the same amount of leg work, but other than the

Byron Horton: sd, you get the undisturbed and the efficiency that we just talked about. As far as like one to one, it's a

Cam Deerfield: 6,000 increase. And how's that any [00:32:00] different than mobile hunting? You get undisturbed.

You're the first person to sit in that tree. No, no, no. You're walking into the woods. They still got a chance. But you're the first, you're still walking into the woods putting that camera in. Yeah. If you think a mature buck, Kevin takes that out here. It takes one time to walk into an area and a and a and a mature buck has got you pinned.

Yeah. And he's gonna worry about that for the rest of his life. I agree. And that's why I'm like, so that's why I'm team no cell cam. Well, if you walk into an area one time and do a, I don't know what your boys called a bump and dump, you should jump a deer and you go. You're, that's more damage than what anything could, could, could, could, could do.

But it's the same process. Mm-hmm. , you know what I mean? You're, you're going in and hunting a deer that you already scared. Mm-hmm. . That's wild. The chances of another deer coming. That's what I think the chance of another deer coming into that bed is higher than that deer coming into that bed. Okay. You know what I mean?

It's a good bedding area for a, a buck. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And if you, and if you know anything about that, like if you shoot him a she buck out of, out of an area, there's gonna be another buck that moves in and uses his same bedding. Okay. There's, that's, that's gonna happen. See, I think that

Byron Horton: bother and, and [00:33:00] we're allowed to disagree cuz I, I'm a little more bothered by some of this.

Yeah. And I think that's you. , I look at my kid. Right? And, and, and I, I think, you know, we talked about, you know, d do you, and I guess, let, let me ask you this, is, is there a line that you think we're approaching where, hey, maybe we need to dial this back. Like if, if cameras can go to thermal, you know, are we gonna dial that back?

Cam Deerfield: If, uh, you know, but what advantages would that have? Would you have from a. Than what, uh, than what you already have. Cam. If I have 40

Byron Horton: or 50 of these cameras with thermal, right, like on my morning hunts, I'd know exactly

Cam Deerfield: where to walk. That camera's not gonna shoot that deer and tag it for you. No, but I know exactly where to avoid.

You'd know exactly where to avoid. Now, you're not a dumb deer. No, no, no, no, no. You're not a dumb deer. I bumped some deer, my friend. Everybody bumps deer, but it's not worried about bumping deer. If you're bumping deer, you're hunting the. Big deer don't, I'm just, don't congregate. But, but literally,

Byron Horton: you know what I mean?

Thermal warning hunts. Like, dude, if I was out there, you know, swap mode. Like, you know, [00:34:00] because

Cam Deerfield: I, I, but people, but people do that now. People literally in farm country right now will take a thermal set of, you know, binos and scanned fields to make sure they're, that's illegal. Yeah. But people do that. Sure.

How many people do you know in this state that would admittedly say that, yeah, you're not, you know what I mean? And it's like, okay, so you're already checking, but they're not on a weapon. So how is it? How's it, how's. They're just making sure there's not deer in the soybean field before they walk in. So

Byron Horton: again, I think that's a, uh, very advantageous to the hunter.

Like it, it's that percent, right? Like I do think the deer should either win and detect the hunter at some point. That, that, that's my big thing, is like,

Cam Deerfield: but that's, that's a naive way of thinking about it. That's when you, like, that's when you break the mold. I think that's when you break the mold of shooting one 30 s to one 90 s.

All right. He never wins. You, you only go in there when the wind's. Even if you run a conventional camera, you only go in when the wind's Right. Not when it's convenient for you. When it's convenient for him. Yeah. You don't hunt deer on your wind. You don't bump [00:35:00] 190 inch deer that's six years old and think you're gonna go in there and bump him two or three times and then go then, then go hunting.

That's the difference. Mm-hmm. , that's where you go from shooting one 30 to one

Byron Horton: nineties. Yeah, and I can admit, like, I haven't played the one 90 game. Well, I don't wanna talk about this too. Well, I mean, we've all fucked up . Sure. But, but, but yeah, to me it's just like, I, I am very, and I think that's, that's my driving thing is like, I'm, I'm looking at this and I'm like, man, are we tipping the odds too much?

And, and the future. Right. Let's talk about the future a little bit. As far as

Cam Deerfield: like, I,

Byron Horton: I want my son's hunting to somewhat look like mine, and I am very much afraid that. , it is going to be security guard access will be more

Cam Deerfield: difficult than, can I be 1000% with you? Your hunting doesn't look like my honey.

And we're not that far in age. Mm-hmm. , I grew up in the old era. Mm-hmm. . I didn't run a truck hammer until I was 25 years old. Um, you know what I mean? And I'm, I'm [00:36:00] 31 now. I, so I haven't been running cameras all that long. Yeah. I didn't understand. I didn't even know we could bait in this state until I was 25 years old.

Yeah. I didn't even know what that meant. I'm like, do we live in cornfield and soybean fields? Why are we baiting. like we're, they're, they already got it. You know what I mean? I had no idea that was even a thing. Yeah. So it's like I grew up in the era of you had to be a woodsman to kill good deer. I grew up in the era of my dad and grandpa taught me how to be a deer hunter.

Yeah. My dad had this one buddy that shot giants and I studied him. , like, I want to know how to kill giants. There's a, cuz I saw at the early age, there's a definitive difference between god's a deer hunt, gods shoot giants. Yeah. There's a definitive difference. And once I learned that difference, then I realized there's 10 other differences in all those categories.

Okay. To be consistent is a whole different category.

Byron Horton: Okay. Um, Kim, is there a, is there a point that, that you're like, ah, that's probably not gonna be fair, chase? Is there a point that you're like, you know, because, because I think as hunters, right? Like we're okay if something comes along and then [00:37:00] we take it away, stick 'em in.

The NFL is a perfect example where a piece of technology came in and they're like, wait, the yard of the catch made it, you know, a, it, it changed the sport, it changed the skill of squeezing a football timing the catch, like to just sticking your hand out and boom, it, it, it. Um, is there a piece that you're worried about or, or can think that you're, you would step in and be like, you know what?

I don't, I don't agree with this being what, what we call hunting, right? This primitive lifestyle, this thing we're so passionate about the thing that we love.

Cam Deerfield: Well, you're not gonna like my answer. Okay. Well, my answer to that is YouTube. I think that's the worst part of technology that's interfere.

Everybody on YouTube thinks they're an elite hunter and they need to put out videos. They need to give advice, they need to talk about their gear, they need to do, that's the art of hunting. That's was never a part of art of hunting. That's a new age type of mm-hmm. type of stuff. Mm-hmm. . So when you bring all that new age in into it, um, you're taking away from the actual sport of deer.

right? You're talking about what gear you're [00:38:00] using, what tree stand you're using. Oh, this is better for this, this is better for the when and the end goal. We're all trying to kill deer. Mm-hmm. . So I think the biggest thing that's been a drawback for hunting has prob and the biggest thing that's helped hunting too.

So it's a double-edged sword. A hundred percent. Yeah. But I'm, I'm definitely a product technology is that mm-hmm. and that's what. . That's, I feel like the only thing that's the difference between me and you in this, in this thing is that that's the difference. You're a technology guy. I'm not, I don't care about YouTube.

I don't care about making videos. I don't care about I I was that guy. Uh, a hundred percent. I was that guy. I lived that life. Okay. I was sponsored by Sitco Zick, black Eagle Arrow. I had all the sponsors. I was the one, the first three hunt shows on Amazon Prime. Like I, I, I was that guy. Mm-hmm. . I enjoyed it.

But then when I realized that hunting isn't what Mark Jewelry said, hunting was. Yeah.

Byron Horton: That's so, so I grew up with the, very much tricked by the, uh, outdoor television dude. I, in college, I'd swipe into the dorm that had the cable package

Cam Deerfield: and I watch when we were 17 years old, being on a pro staff. It, it probably doesn't.

It doesn't now. [00:39:00] Yeah. It really doesn't now. And these guys will sell their soul to be on a pro staff. That's the biggest thing that's wrong with the hunting industry in my eyes. Okay. Is people are not true of themselves. They, uh, I'm very, and I, you know, me, I, me, I'm very vocal about that. Yeah. Like, I don't, I don't, you keep, be straight

Byron Horton: sometimes, cuz I'll DM you because I think people see me and you comment sometimes and they don't know.

Like, I'll call Cam and. Cam, you're right. Yeah. There was a gear thing like, dude, like you said, guys are so focused on tree stands, and I'm like, Hey Cam, I'm gonna say I'm guilty on this. I apologize.

Cam Deerfield: You're right. Like I'll take a summit climber out there and kill the biggest deer in the woods. Well, you wanna know why?

Cause I'm gonna devote my life to it. I'm gonna hunt every single day until he's dead. Yeah. I'm gonna quit my job. I'm gonna do whatever it takes. That's the grit. Okay? Your tree stand, don't matter. Your camo don't matter. Your arrows don't matter. Your bow don't matter. Okay? The grit matters. And when I look at a deer hunter who I respect, I look at.

If you got the grit. Okay. Okay. So like you look at a guy who's running, so how many cameras do you run on public a year?

Byron Horton: I [00:40:00] probably have in the field at a given time, 20 ish plus or minus five,

Cam Deerfield: which is respectable for the average guy. Okay. Right. Yeah. For a guy who's devoted his life to it on public, on an average year, not this year, cuz the ADHD hit and I was just like, I'm not dealing with it.

I'm hunting outta outta. , on an average year, I'm running anywhere from 75 to 150 cameras on On public. Yeah. And so is that an advantage over you? Just cause I run more cameras, you know what I mean? So what's the difference between that and a cell camera? I'd rather run 40 cell cameras and minimize it as opposed to running 150 cameras and go blowing all my deer out and having no deer to hunt on o opening day as opposed to like, okay, well if I can go in there in the first week and shoot on 170 that I found already, and I know he is.

boom. Done. Yeah. That's the goal, right?

Byron Horton: Yeah. And I don't think, uh, I'm not gonna change your mind, but for me, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm team no cell cam because of the, the undisturbed factor, right? Like bypassing a little bit of the detection and, uh, that [00:41:00] ability to

Cam Deerfield: be everywhere. It's, to me, it's no different than blind, than like blind scouting.

You're going, you're going into an area that you're undetected. And if you know, if you, if you know, if you know enough about. , you're gonna out hunt everybody there. It's not that hard. You know, the average public land hunting, sure. You're gonna out hunt him.

Byron Horton: Sure, sure, sure. , you know what, I think a, so Cam takes a guy who let, let's call him like a four or five out of 10 on the scale.

Cam Deerfield: I wouldn't say that. I think it takes back, back in the day, back in the day when I was outfitting, I watched a lot of dudes come in with a top gear thinking they were macho, dude. And they fucking sent me a picture of a bucket at 40 yards. That's that's looking at him. So, so I, yeah. And I can You still have to be a good deer hunter to kill the deer.

Yeah. Yeah.

Byron Horton: Yeah. My, my outfitting buddy though, like, he's like, some weeks, like we, we looked at his schedule week by week. Yeah. Some weeks very, very noticeable. Increase in effectiveness. Mm-hmm. . ,

Cam Deerfield: but that was probably during rut.

Byron Horton: Um, I can't say [00:42:00] much because he does feel he has some

Cam Deerfield: advantages. Um, rut and late season.

There's few advantage. There's a few times

Byron Horton: he, he noticed, okay, there might be like a, an 11% increase one week, but there are weeks where he, he about doubled his percentage. Yeah. So,

Cam Deerfield: but that depends on time of season. Any camera would double with percentage in a certain time of season. Um, as long as you know where to put.

But, but he was, but you have

Byron Horton: to know where to put that. He was able to put a hunter somewhere, not because he walked

Cam Deerfield: in there. Okay. So from that aspect, so say you're a out-of-state hunter and you're coming into a guy and you're paying $5,000, come to your hunt, would you rather him run cell cameras or regular cameras?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. It's a no-brainer. You know what I mean? Yeah. Okay. So it's like that's the advantage. . The advantage is that you still have to put the work in. You still have to find the deer. You still have to put the camera on the right. You're talking about a million trees in the woods, and you put it on the one single tree that got a one 60 on.

Okay. Final thought. Are you ever

Byron Horton: concerned we're gonna walk in the woods and see like th like a camera, every fourth

Cam Deerfield: tree? If, if Ohio doesn't go to a draw state, probably . [00:43:00] I

Byron Horton: mean, it's getting wild. That is a great answer. That is a great answer. It's getting. Okay, we're gonna cut this now and we're gonna do a more fun

Cam Deerfield: bs, uh, little bit wider variety.

Byron Horton: More

Cam Deerfield: of a a a cam. I'm having a good time. This is, this has been really cool. This was a good conversation.

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