Show Notes
On this episode of the Nine Finger Chronicles, Dan is joined by Jeremy Nicholson of Missouri to chat about his early season success. Jeremy talks about the fully operational agriculture farm that his family owns and hunts. He breaks down the terrain, where he feels the deer bed, and how they move through their property. This year was a special year for Jeremy as he was able to connect on an absolute giant buck. The story and the strategy on this episode! Enjoy!
Show Transcript
[00:00:00] Dan: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of the nine finger chronicles podcast. I'm your host, Dan Johnson, and today. I am recording this in advance because right now, when you're listening to this and when this launches, I am balls deep in a South Dakota hunt, more than likely I'm getting my ass handed to me by the deer of Western South Dakota.
And but the good news is that I'm looking at the forecast and it's supposed to be warm for the first two days, like in the seventies, which should be very nice. And then a cold front is going to come in where it's going to rain. I think there's a [00:01:00] 50 percent chance 30 40 50 percent chance it's going to rain for two days.
Then it's going to potentially snow and then the highs. are going to be in the high twenties, low thirties. And so this is the latest that I have ever been in South Dakota. And I'm really looking forward to seeing what what plays out because of this. I'm I have a feeling I'm going to see a lot of deer movement, especially in this.
With this front that's coming through the issue slowly becomes if it's going to be wet for a lot of days, whether or not I will be able to drive as far as I need to get to some of the positions or locations that I have hunted in the past, a lot of dirt roads, a lot of sand roads a couple hills.
Two I'm thinking of three actually I'm thinking of in particular where it's [00:02:00] really steep and if it's a lot of like big pebbles that make it slippery even when it's dry and so There's some things that I need to think about there And I'm hoping that either the rain is minimal in this event And then that only allows me to get to where I want to get and so There's that ba Short intro today.
But we're going to be talking with a guy named Jeremy Nicholson from Missouri who just shot the biggest buck of his life and just shot the biggest buck that has been on his farm in a very long time, if ever. And so today we talk about this fully functioning farm, both in agriculture and livestock.
We talk about the fact that it's mainly. agriculture and cattle operation, and it's not a lot of trees, right? It's, but the deer live on another farm and they [00:03:00] use his farm as a transition, use his farm as a food source. And so that's what the whole, it's the whole breakdown. If you listen, if you've ever listened to this podcast, you know exactly what's coming your way.
An awesome story, an awesome breakdown. And not only in the deer herd that. Itself the terrain that this hunter hunts on and then the the strategy that went into Killing this buck. And so that's what we're talking about today I'm gonna run through this quick because I got to get back to hunting here we go with the commercials if you're looking for a badass saddle check out Tethered is an awesome saddle, saddle operation.
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Take that. With a great assault. All right. Let's get into today's episode with [00:07:00] Jeremy Nicholson on an absolutely gigantic buck that he got this early season. Enjoy Three two one welcome back to the nine finger chronicles podcast and today we're going to be joined by gerald jeremy nicholson of missouri Dude, thanks for taking time out of your day to hop on
[00:07:21] Jeremy: No problem happy to
[00:07:21] Dan: be here.
All right, so you slayed a giant and we're gonna get into that whole story Here in a moment, but before we do what do you do for a living?
[00:07:32] Jeremy: So yeah, I'm the lead sales consultant for a e commerce agency and digital marketing agency called classy llama. So we're based on a Based out of Springfield, Missouri.
Okay We do a lot of digital marketing stuff and build transactional websites for people in the, a lot of automotive, a lot of manufacturing, a lot of outdoor industry, to be honest. So yeah, that's that's what we do. I, travel once or twice a month, but [00:08:00] stay pretty busy with
[00:08:00] Dan: that. Gotcha.
So for the uninitiated you help other companies sell their products digitally. Correct. Okay. Yep. All right.
[00:08:11] Jeremy: And build websites mainly on, on the big commerce Adobe platforms. Perfect.
[00:08:17] Dan: Perfect. Yep. Okay, cool. Let's talk about. I don't know why this first question popped into my head, but I feel like maybe it's because I live in Iowa and I know a lot of people who hunt Missouri to or live in Missouri and hunt Missouri, especially the guys from the Missouri woods and water podcast there over there.
I believe Western. Western Missouri, West Central, Southwest. Anyway, I hear them talk about the, a lot of people talk about Missouri's rules and regulations as far as, deer hunting is concerned. How, what are your thoughts? Good, bad, ugly.
[00:08:57] Jeremy: It's going to overall bad. In my opinion [00:09:00] I'm jealous of the Iowa's jealous of the.
I'm not a big fan of the rifle seasons right during the rut. I it's funny you ask that. I was, I sent a picture, I saw a picture on social media today of the 1984 deer season in Missouri and what that looked like. They didn't allow anybody to shoot a doe. Okay. And in, in the county I'm in, they didn't allow does.
You had to shoot bucks. I just remember growing up starting to hunt when I was like 10. So I would have been in the mid nineties. Yeah. Grandpa and dad were like, don't shoot. We hardly ever saw deer. But today there's a really good deer population. It's gotten a lot better.
Overall regulations. I'm just, I'm not a huge fan of the, it being in the rut. Yeah. The rifle season. Yep. I'm not a huge fan of the cheap nonresident tags. Obviously a resident, I don't we've got some land up north, about 50 miles from the Iowa line and it's, it gets littered with, nonresidents coming in.
It's a, it's an easy state to hunt for nonresidents. Yeah.
[00:09:58] Dan: Yeah. And I think [00:10:00] what you're going to start seeing. Is a reduction of non resident tags statewide. And I feel like, I don't know why I per se, I think that the hunters are finally going to start speaking up and saying, Hey dude, like we don't like this.
And the only issue is that initial initially, I feel like it's going to tear the hunting community a little bit because. You go to some guy who loves hunting the rut with a rifle and you say, hey, dude, we're going to push it back a week. Like, when does the rifle season in Missouri start?
[00:10:40] Jeremy: This year, November 10th, I believe. It's normally from the the 10th to the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. And there are just... So many deer killed, we've got a north. We've got several antler restriction counties, four point sides. I maybe I'm wrong, but I don't see that helping at all.
I see those beautiful two year old cans that [00:11:00] get shot is what I see. And to be honest, here in Southwest Missouri, if you look at the deer we've killed up north versus the deer we've killed in Southwest Missouri me, my brothers and my dad. There's not any difference. Yeah, there's different body size, but as far as score and age There's not much difference, right?
[00:11:21] Dan: This is like I agree with you But I have this always have this internal debate, if I said Hey, man, I would love for Let's say I was a missouri resident, but i'm a big bowhunter. I love to bow on I will I want to push I want to push the rifle season back a week or two weeks or mimic Iowa, whatever the case may be.
So that not so many deer are shot during the during the rut with a rifle. Okay. Cause obviously hunting with a rifle during the rut is easier. Would you agree? Okay. [00:12:00] So then I think of somebody who's a first time hunter or someone who Can't put in the time dedicated to side a bow in right?
Maybe they're just really busy. Bow hunting is my passion. So I make time to go do that but if we reduce or move that into a potentially colder time of year into a Portion of the year where the rut is winding down and deer start to move less Do you think that would impact the overall?
License sales and hunters actually hunting numbers actually decline.
[00:12:43] Jeremy: Yes, I believe it would. Okay. I believe it is, but I don't think it'd be like the 1st year or 2. Let's say, for instance, we go into December with it with the rifle. I think the 1st people would go in and they'd hunt right? They would probably realize that.
They're not maybe not [00:13:00] killing as many deer. It's going to be colder. Definitely. Missouri's. Missouri, the temperatures can be in the 70s. During the rifle season. So it's pretty comfortable still. Yeah. So I definitely think that it would be a loss of reduction of tags and definitely harvest for sure.
[00:13:15] Dan: Gotcha. Okay. And then Oh, go ahead.
[00:13:20] Jeremy: No, I can see what you're I can definitely see why their thought process is what they is what it is. And they don't want to. I think that people in Missouri don't want to be just like Iowa. So they have a lot of non residents come in.
[00:13:31] Dan: Yeah, yeah, obviously.
And from my understanding, I know that northern Missouri has that ag Transcribed That egg mix but the further south you get into it you start to like especially when you're in between st. Louis and kansas city through the ozarks there. Holy cow, man. That's just that's big timber country
[00:13:53] Jeremy: Yeah When you get into the ozarks and then you go straight down south to the middle of the state there it's very you know, those are [00:14:00] mountainous.
But once you get out honestly, it's changed a lot in the last 10 years with where we're located. From basically Springfield, Missouri West about to Kansas. Yep. There's a lot more crops now than what there was a decade ago. So I think that has a huge, that's how that's, we've seen a big difference in the quality of deer, obviously southwest Missouri just from the crops.
There's a lot more of them out here.
[00:14:25] Dan: What are they doing? Turning like old cattle pasture into cropland again. Yep. Yep. Yep. Are they clearing timber then as well?
[00:14:33] Jeremy: There's not I wouldn't say that. There's some places that are clearing timber. I really haven't, we haven't seen it in the places we hunt.
We've just seen open fields go to cross.
[00:14:41] Dan: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Food source. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Food source equals bigger antlers and everybody loves bigger antlers. All so let's talk a little bit about the terrain on your farm that you hunt, especially this particular deer. Talk about the terrain that you hunt.
Talk about the neighboring or like the [00:15:00] whole area surrounding your farms and what that terrain looks like.
[00:15:04] Jeremy: Sure. Terrain is, I'd call it, it's pretty rolling hills. Not near as not. Creeks, not huge ditches. There's not a lot of big, deep ditches. Like we see up when we hunt up north and northern Missouri.
So a lot, there's going to be food. There's going to be blocks of timber. So the, the particular area that we hunting we're limited in timber with some of our farms. So we have several deer that. They're definitely not living just on where we can hunt. They're back and forth, on other, on other people's property, on our property, so that's a little bit what it's like, yeah,
[00:15:36] Dan: I gotcha. Okay. And so is it like a, you said rolling hills, but are we talking like a timber egg mix with timber fingers or are we talking bigger blocks of woods?
[00:15:46] Jeremy: I'm talking bigger blocks like we biggest block would probably be around. I would say 50 60 acres of timber. And some fingers.
We don't get a lot of fingers that go out into these big ag fields. I would say ag [00:16:00] fields would be anywhere between 10 to 30 40 acres that you're going to see. You're not going to see these big 100 acre ag fields with big, fingers of timber coming out. We don't, we're not hunting that in Southwest Missouri.
Okay,
[00:16:10] Dan: cool. All right. So then with that said break down your farm you know what the access is like like what kind of, is it heavy bedding? Do you have a lot of transition? Do you have good staging? Do you have food? What's the story there?
[00:16:26] Jeremy: I would say it just, it varies on the prop, on the properties where I was.
particularly hunting. I would say it's all food. Deer. Not all food, about 90 percent of food. And then there's about 10 percent of transition where we try to intercept them when they're coming off, off of us on food to bedding. And that's what got this one.
[00:16:44] Dan: Okay. So you're telling me that, and I just envisioned this, that it's a big, it's big ag field with like buffer strips and waterways that run through it.
[00:16:55] Jeremy: Yeah, fence fence crossings. On this particular piece, there's, going to [00:17:00] be it's going to be, it's really just like a a 50, 60 acre piece, right?
And it's mainly beans right now. There's fence rows that they like to use. We're pretty. We're pretty detailed with our cameras. There's some spots where we've gotten pictures and we know where deer go and how they move the terrain. And then our access, our access really helps.
We can access it from both sides. So we know, we're pretty, we've seen these deer make these routes in the past. So being able to know what they like is definitely what what helps for sure.
[00:17:29] Dan: Okay. Do you guys have food plots or leave food in the
[00:17:31] Jeremy: fields?
Yeah we do. We do. We have a few different types of food plots. We, we, we have clover, we've got some turnips, some brassicas, mainly on this particular piece that I was at, it was just beans. We don't have, we don't have any food plots on it. Just standing beans. I haven't combined them yet.
[00:17:46] Dan: Yeah, I believe you were saying before we started recording that this is a work. This is not only ag, but it's also a working cattle dairy operation.
[00:17:56] Jeremy: Yeah, I grew up on a dairy farm, but we sold that. I sold, [00:18:00] or my grandpa sold that dairy farm. Now my dad just, he backgrounds cattle, so he has cattle on the farm, but they, they're not in this area.
We own around there's about 300 acres here. About 150 of its cattle. The other We can hunt it. Gotcha. Okay
[00:18:18] Dan: and so Where are the deer betting because it sounded to me like the way you described it They're betting on a neighboring farm and then popping over to you And then you have this transition.
Is that accurate?
[00:18:30] Jeremy: Oh, yeah, perfect. Yep. That's accurate there's a big block of timber. A timbered area probably I would say 300 acres of, were. There's a lot of wood, there's a lot of woods, there's some creeks through there, there's not hardly any ag in that piece they're going, they're traveling a couple hundred yards to get to our property to hunt, so there's a pretty big transition area, we'll see some deer that, that'll come, they'll come stay, stay on us for maybe a day or two, and then we'll get a picture of them for weeks and that's how [00:19:00] this one was the majority
[00:19:00] Dan: of the time.
Okay. This buck That I'm looking at here is a slob. He's gigantic. What's that one brow time? Is that 10 inches 12 inches? Yeah,
[00:19:09] Jeremy: it's a little over 10. Yeah, I'm looking at it Okay, so
[00:19:16] Dan: people have to know about him, especially in a state like Missouri, right? Were the surrounding farms serious hunters to, did they have trail cameras out? Did they know about him? Did they talk to you about him?
[00:19:27] Jeremy: No, we didn't have any conversations at all. We try to keep pretty quiet to ourselves.
Me and my two brothers, my dad we knew about this deer two years ago, we had one or two one for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Who probably pictures of him during the summer look like a 3 year old probably had 1415 scoreables. And we're like, wow let's see about him. And then the next year, we only had a few pictures of him, didn't stay very much on our farm at all.
And then this year we had a few pictures. During the summer and then. He [00:20:00] was very, like I said, just very similar. We hardly ever got pictures of him. We had him in the back of our mind, but didn't really think we had a really great shot at him. And then and then the, then a couple of Saturday mornings ago, it happened.
Yeah.
[00:20:12] Dan: On the fee on this farm, that's mostly egg. Do you see an uptick in deer movement or home bodies on your farm, depending on what crop you have in the dirt?
[00:20:27] Jeremy: Not particularly. We don't see too many changes with our deer with the crops. We don't rotate we're, where we particularly are hunting, there's not much rotation.
Dan, it's just mainly soybeans is what it is. So we don't see a lot of difference in that cause we're, there's not a lot of corn around where we're at.
[00:20:43] Dan: Okay. So you're running beans on beans most time. Okay. Yep. And and so obviously soybeans, summer deer, love that.
And so that's three years of history with this buck. And then [00:21:00] it's, and then they skedaddle after the, after like they strip velvet. Or did you ever get any hard horn pictures of them on the property?
[00:21:09] Jeremy: Yeah we did. He was running with a bachelor with a pretty good bachelor group. They dispersed.
There's a couple that are obviously a lot more more noticeable. They're around. They're around the area a lot more this 1. we hadn't had a picture of this 1 in several weeks. The last picture we had of him. We felt like he he, his body didn't look very good. Okay. We felt like this deer, if this was the deer we thought it was, he was far away.
We thought he didn't look, he thought he might've looked sick. So got a little worried about it. But again, wasn't spending a lot of time on our property. We're just crossing our fingers, just hoping he might show up. This was for this area. This was really the only deer that we were were wanting to shoot.
We had a couple of three year olds four year olds that really were hoping we'd give them another year.
[00:21:53] Dan: Okay. You, you identified this year that this deer was sickly looking and then how much time [00:22:00] went by from the time that you got that picture, the last picture of this buck to the time season started and you were able to go on.
[00:22:10] Jeremy: It was right around season opener whenever we got that picture and we're like, yeah. I think dad was like, yeah, look, that deer doesn't look very good. And he was right. There, then that was the last picture, I believe that was the last picture we had of him until I was able to harvest
[00:22:28] Dan: him.
Okay. All right. So did you and I have weeks. Okay. Did you feel that he. Disappeared after that. When a deer For me when a deer does something like that because I live on a farm or I hunt on a farm where Summer is awesome. If I was to base this summer was different though. Most of the time Summer's awesome.
I'll put a mineral station out and I'll just get giants coming, like your typical Boone and Crockett deer coming to a mineral station in velvet, [00:23:00] pretty pictures to look at. But then I know when antlers, when the velvet comes off. It's a new story, right? They shift, they disperse and some years I'm left with a good one.
Some years I'm not. And I don't get too terribly excited because I know that there's this shift. Did you, did your gut tell you he's gone or that he was going to stick around and you might have an opportunity for
[00:23:23] Jeremy: him? The, our, my gut was that most of the time. He's not going to be on the property.
We can hunt and therefore we don't have a very good chance of killing the deer. That's where our goal was. In the past we've had deer that are a lot more homebodies, they're on the farm 60, 70, sometimes 80 percent of the time we feel like they're on the farm.
We obviously feel like we have a lot better chance at harvesting those deer. And then guess what? Sometimes we don't. Sometimes they run, chase people off on the property and somebody shoots them. This was we got our got lucky on that deal where we actually were able to harvest a deer.
I was able to harvest deer that didn't spend majority of the time on our property. [00:24:00] Yeah. Okay. It was nice to see that circle come
[00:24:02] Dan: through. And with this farm being so much agriculture Are tree stand options limited? Are you hunting a lot out of a blind?
[00:24:13] Jeremy: Mostly, it's all, it's tree stands.
Tree stands. There's enough trees on the properties. Okay. That we're hunting a lot of, we're hunting a lot of hang ons. We've got several hang ons in the, on the properties. We do have a couple of, makeshift platforms. We've got a, we've got a hunting house that was made out of a...
My grandma and grandpa's like little play house. We we got we got creative with that. And then yeah, we have our old school climbers that, sometimes if we want to get in an old school climber, we will you know. I've got a Novick. So we just have, I've got a saddle.
We, we just, you got all the tools now we're just trying to do everything we can to, but mostly it's fixed stands that have already been prepped during the
[00:24:52] Dan: summer. Gotcha. Okay. All right. And so with you not, let me ask you this. [00:25:00] What early season, right? So you, you said to yourself, Hey, I want to go out and hunt on this day.
Correct. What did you expect the deer to be doing? I want to talk about from the bed to food pattern. Was this in morning hunter? Afternoon hunt. This is actually morning. Morning hunt. All right. So I want you to talk to us about what the deer do on these properties where they get out of their bed, they come to food source and then they transition back into bed.
Walk us through the terrain that these deer are using and where your ambush points are in that line.
[00:25:38] Jeremy: Sure. Yeah. Obviously throughout the evening, they're going to be in the beans. Okay. They're going to be roaming around the beans there. There's some folks on that property.
They're dropping acorns. So they're going to be there. Majority of the deer. Then I would say there's about a. There's about there's a 3 pronged approach to a lot of these where these deer will go. They can either go West. They can go East or they can [00:26:00] go South. Do what we would call bed. We had a cold front.
Coming we had a cold front come through. It was the 1st cold front we had in October. And I was able to access it. We have a really good access point from the South. So I can get in the the terrain is rolling. I'm below the beans. When I'm coming up so I can hunt right next to the beans and still get in there and it's a little risky at the right in the corner, but thankfully they're not.
And, we and they, we got, I was able to get that beer luckily coming. off of that field south and coming to the bed, which, I feel like I could be wrong, but I feel like that deer was headed still had about two to 400 yards to go before he
[00:26:42] Dan: got to his bed. Okay. All right.
And so was this the first day that you could hunt or what? Nope. Was this a September kill or October?
[00:26:54] Jeremy: It's October. Bo, Bo season starts September 15th. Yeah. So it was October. Yeah, it was the first week [00:27:00] of October.
[00:27:00] Dan: Okay. All right. All right. And so you and so right around season opener, 15 days, 15 days previous, whatever the days were you got a picture of him.
in that same
[00:27:14] Jeremy: line. Yes, y of him. Basically wes west access is what I wou west access. We got a pic I couldn't get that to th
I guess the south southeastern point where they're accessing, right? Okay. So is that making sense? Like a kind of field access, either the access bed southeast or southwest. Yep. Go around, around some equipment, around some houses and things like that. Okay.
[00:27:48] Dan: All right. And so then why didn't you go after this deer right away in September when you got that picture of him?
[00:27:59] Jeremy: We did. No I [00:28:00] did. We definitely were hunting. We just didn't, we just weren't seeing them. Okay. We hunted. I had a really good hunt in an evening. My first sit there, I hunted had a really good hunt, saw several does, saw a good young 10, just wasn't, just didn't see him, and then we've had, we have some, we had some other places where we hunted and if I can get a couple of hunts in it's very difficult.
We got, It's like just like you got kid. I got three kids that are actively involved in sports. So Very hard for me to get afternoon hunts in. Yep with the family.
[00:28:29] Dan: Yep. All right was that first picture that you got of him this year? Was that a nocturnal pick? Yep Okay, so that tells you a little bit like what time of night was it
[00:28:38] Jeremy: close it's dead and dead in the dead Not even
[00:28:42] Dan: close
Okay, so this cold front comes through right and We're when you were hunting. Were you looking for a doe? Were you looking for a different buck? No,
[00:28:57] Jeremy: I was, I came in to that [00:29:00] hunt. My daughter had a junior high volleyball game all ball tournament. So I was able to sneak away and I knew we had a Northwest wind.
I knew my access would be really good in this particular spot. And I knew I had until about 9 o'clock to hunt. So I was going to get a little tree stand therapy in. And I had basically one deer on my mind. That's the only one I was going to, so I went in there, crossed my fingers. Didn't have a lot of high hopes but.
But the morning just felt good, like it just felt amazing out there. It was high pressure cooler temps. It just felt good to be in a tree, and the wind was good. I ended up bumping actually two does, or I think they were does coming in on the way in, which surprised me a little bit, but yeah.
[00:29:47] Dan: Okay. Where abouts did this day land? in the cold front. Did the cold front come through and pass and it was bluebird skies?
[00:29:56] Jeremy: It was so I believe I go back on the wonder blonde [00:30:00] and look thursday, I think the cold front came through and the pressure was rising all the way. And I, it, ironically, it was peaking saturday morning.
Okay. underground. The deer were everywhere that morning, saturday morning, they were absolutely everywhere. There was deer. Like when I left the stand, there was deer. My brothers were seeing deer. My dad was seeing deer. It was just one of those special mornings for
[00:30:23] Dan: sure.
Yeah. All right. So you're in a tree, sun starting to come up. What were you seeing?
[00:30:31] Jeremy: Sun coming up, didn't see a lot really. It was as soon as I started where I can probably shooting light. I saw a doe to my right and I was watching her. It was pretty quiet morning and all of a sudden, I happened to put my binoculars down, look over to the left and I see a deer and it is very thick where I'm thick area right here in this corner and there it was.
I saw it brought the binoculars up. I saw the brown time. And I [00:31:00] saw mass. Okay, so I saw the brow and I saw mass knew it was him. Came right out in the opening. 15 yards. Grunted at him or to stop him because he was moving. He was walking very quickly. He was going somewhere and I stopped him.
And when I stopped him, he did a lot like 1 of my other deer. Another deer I killed about in, I think, 2020 very mature deer up north when I stopped him, he just. His whole body just broke. Bang. What was that? Got out and shot him. And then gone right off. Fletchings, fletching.
He went, it wasn't a full pass through. And. Yeah, I couldn't really tell he was gone so quickly. I couldn't tell how far if where it was on the body, if it was front of the shoulder, how far back it was. So we elected to, I, I called made the phone calls, right? And I did too, just go ahead and go to my daughter's game. I went to two of her games and then came back and got on the track and it was, he died in 100 yards. So it was pretty awesome. [00:32:00] But from the
[00:32:00] Dan: time that you saw him To the time that you drew back and pulled the trigger.
Yeah. How much time was that?
[00:32:07] Jeremy: 10 seconds. Like I had zero zero time or opportunity to get to just start freaking out. Like for me, a couple of other deer I've killed previously, I've grunted at them and I've seen them from 200 yards, a hundred yards and I've got to watch them come in.
And that's when I get wiggly. Yeah. And I start squirming. Agree. This I have zero time, zero time. And just, the takeaway is just making sure you're ready. It's, I've found it in the past, just catching myself not being ready, being on my phone, texting, scrolling, doing stuff like that.
I think the takeaway is just, I'm just really thankful I was ready and I wasn't jacking around on my phone.
[00:32:50] Dan: I'm going to say this dude that you make a valid point there because this weekend I was hunting on a farm that does not get good if any cell reception, [00:33:00] okay? And so I couldn't use my phone. I, if I got bored, I would pull up old pictures and I'd scroll back three, three years and Oh, picture of my kid, from three years ago, whatever, or I'm looking up, trail camera pictures that I've saved or I'm on X, like a saved map on X or something like that.
And so I really wasn't on my phone a lot. I was just had it in my binocular case and I was just watching nature, which is cool. And if I was on my phone, I bet you, I wouldn't have seen this doe that was in front of me, which meant that I wouldn't have seen her pop her head up and look across the drainage where these two bucks were.
This weekend. And so they weren't shooters, but still, if I was messing around, maybe I was swinging in the saddle and they weren't paying attention and they would have blown me out. But what's it like shooting a deer of this caliber? And then leaving it and going to pay attention to your daughter, play a volleyball game.
[00:33:54] Jeremy: There wasn't much paying attention. The first call was to my wife. I [00:34:00] tell her, Hey hun, plans have changed today. We are we're going to have to drive separately to the volleyball tournament because. I'm leaving after the second game. We're not, I'm not staying the rest of the day, and she she was good.
She was she was a great sport with that. So after that second game, I peeled out of there really, I start second guessing myself like crazy. I remember even second guessing myself if it was even that deer, cause it just happened so quick. Did I black out? Was that even the deer that.
I thought it was was I way back? Was I and then you get there, we get on the blood and, it was a good shot. That was, and one of the most special things about it is just we, I was able to wait because my oldest brother, of course, he had a basketball tournament, his girls and my younger brother had a basketball tournament, his boys.
And we were able to. All get back there and just get on the track together. So all 4 of us were able to recover the animal because, let's be honest there's a lot of, there's a lot of work that goes into it. And for all 4 of us to, all summer, prepping stands, putting cameras out [00:35:00] putting mineral out, hanging stands, switching stands.
It's just a, it's a lot. It's a lot of work. And that's why really, it's just the process really killing the animal. It was awesome. Yeah. But just the whole memories and the process of it all. It's almost sad when it ends. Yeah,
[00:35:15] Dan: that's a fact, man. Yeah that's a good point. I've had a couple deer that I've chased really hard throughout the years and whether I got them or whether the neighbor got them, it's just now what?
I guess now you just start over again, right? And so I completely, I get that now trail camera pictures. Your dad said, hey man, this deer doesn't look. healthy. All right. So what did you find when you found the deer and walked up on him?
[00:35:44] Jeremy: Yeah. Yeah. So when we got up on him, we noticed immediately he was real mangy.
And his hips were, his back hips were showing his spine was, he was real bony. Very small body. And then whenever I went, I was cleaning the animal, there was a big big [00:36:00] spot scab area, probably like a small pizza size, right?
And we got him, we got into the barn and. Then, I went to Cape him out and he had a big spot right here under his jaw line. Like just a, like a lump of something and, local conservation agent. I called them and they came out and they looked at it and I didn't know what it was.
It ended up being a big gland. I don't know if it's a, I think it's a, is a thyroid gland. Anyway, it was a gland that he said, and it was about four times what it should be. He said the deer was severely infected. So we're thinking, we're thinking maybe got hit by a car because that in between bedding and food, there's definitely a road farmer, so we could have got hit.
Could have got shot, could have got shot with a small caliber rifle even. So definitely, he definitely, it didn't look like he was going to make it through the rut for sure.
[00:36:49] Dan: Yeah.
[00:36:49] Jeremy: Which even makes it sweeter that we were able to harvest him.
[00:36:51] Dan: Yeah. Yeah. And so right before he dies and coyotes get him or whatever.
But at the same time, [00:37:00] he's, is he 170 plus?
[00:37:03] Jeremy: Yeah, he taped it. I gross taped him at 180. He is a large deer. Yeah. 20. We didn't realize how much mass he was going to have. He has, he's got his threes, his, I just his, I'm looking at him here. Is you got a skull
[00:37:20] Dan: cap right there? Yeah.
Yeah. Pull it out. Show the, I've
[00:37:24] Jeremy: got, I have, he I took him to the taxidermist and then the taxidermist just gives me the rack, but he still had velvet on. So he still got velvet on his tips, which makes me a wonder if that has something to do with. An injury. Likely, this three right here is 12 inches.
This one's 11. And then the fork here on the
[00:37:42] Dan: G fork on the left G two deep fork. Yeah. So what you got 12 scoreable or 11?
[00:37:50] Jeremy: He's got a little, he's got he's got
a four, five, six, he's got 13. He's got a little point and yellow [00:38:00] kicker here. He's got a bigger office too. It's a little one. He's a special deer. I know that, with 15 plus years, they probably run in 20 to 30 cameras in the area. That's 25 inches more than a deer we've ever gotten pictures of.
Okay. So that's the idea that. Was
[00:38:20] Dan: there so what makes a deer like that survive and get that big? Obviously he had some superior genetics, right? What did you think he was for an age?
[00:38:33] Jeremy: I think it was five
[00:38:34] Dan: five. Okay. All right, so a hundred eighty inch five year old man. That's pretty good especially in a right a rifle rut or a run rifle state.
What do you think led to this deer getting away for all those years to get this age and get that antler size?
[00:38:56] Jeremy: I think one of the main things has to do with the place that [00:39:00] he lived most of his time in the big bedding big area there. It didn't seem I don't know what, what happened, but there used to be a big group come in and rifle hunt that haven't seen them in the last two years.
Good. One of the reasons why this deer was probably still alive. And it was world war three over there for sure. But that has a lot to, that has a lot to do with it. And just I think that this deer, it just he obviously any deer in Missouri that can get to five is, is a special animal that doesn't come out in daylight very much, right?
That is
[00:39:33] Dan: for sure. Yeah, for sure. That's awesome, man. What, what did the conservation officer do with the deer? Or did you have to do anything special sign something or hand over the body or something like that? No,
[00:39:49] Jeremy: That was a learning, that was a learning experience for us too.
Yeah, they came in, they documented it and we we were able to dismiss the deer. They just documented it and said, yep, I wouldn't [00:40:00] need it either. You're free to
[00:40:01] Dan: go. Okay. All right. You were advised not to eat the deer. I get it. What about, did they do, take any samples or do any testing?
[00:40:09] Jeremy: No, they didn't. They didn't. It was pretty obvious that the deer was infected from a wound. Okay. Yeah. That's what the determination was.
[00:40:18] Dan: Gotcha. All right. Cool. Dude, congratulations on an absolute slob. It sounds like you have... How many tags can you get in Missouri?
[00:40:28] Jeremy: We can get, you can get as many dough tags as you want.
Yeah. You can get, you can, it's a two buck state technically I can't, I won't shoot a buck or I probably won't shoot one this year, the rest of the year. But you can get, you, I'm able to shoot another one in rifle season. Gotcha. If I put one in rifle, then I can go back to archery.
[00:40:43] Dan: So is that what you can have one archery tag.
And then you can have one rifle tag. And if you don't feel your rifle tag, you can use that tag late season archery. Correct. Okay.
[00:40:54] Jeremy: That's how I understand it anyway. Yeah. So I haven't killed it. I haven't killed two bucks in the same year [00:41:00] forever. Yeah. There's a lot of other people in the family that are after one.
I'm looking forward to grabbing a video camera and. Put my saddle on and hopping in the stand with them and taking my kids youth season. So looking for a forward to a fun fall for sure. That's awesome. That's awesome. It's it sucks to have your tag field, but it's relieving and I just look forward to.
Getting in a stand and getting outside. Yeah. You look at the news this morning and every morning and overseas they're doing all they can to just stay alive in Israel right now. We're out here able to hunt and enjoy our time. So very thankful for that.
[00:41:35] Dan: Absolutely. And, when it comes to tagging out early, I've had a couple of those seasons where I've maybe hunted three total hunts, four total hunts.
Not counting like a early season weekend or something like that, but like my rut vacation that I dedicate time to is three or four sets and then I tagged out. And so short term you go, God, I wish I was in a tree. You tag that buck, you take him to the [00:42:00] taxidermist and the processor, then it's done.
Yeah. But. You only think about that for just one year, because then you look back at it as this deer is going to be on your wall and you just look back at it and you go, Hey man, that was cool, right? That was cool that I got this buck and you don't think so much about the amount of time that you didn't hunt.
But the story is, if it was a different dude, I hunted this buck for 20 days in a row, right? Finally, I finally got him but man, there's so that's for sure. Yeah. Man, good luck the rest of the season. Hopefully your dad or your brothers or the kids in the family get an opportunity at a, some, fill the freezer or get the experience or get another giant on the wall.
So thanks for taking time out of your day to do this, man. Appreciate it.
[00:42:48] Jeremy: No problem. Thanks for having me. Good luck.
[00:42:52] Dan: And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen, another episode in the books. Huge shout out to Jeremy. Huge shout out to all of you. Huge shout out to Tether, Wasp, Vortex, Code [00:43:00] Blue, Woodman's Pal, Huntworth, and Full Sneak Gear.
Please go out and support the companies that support this podcast. Last but not least, good vibes this time of year. It's going to get you a long way and wear your damn safety harness. Have a good one.
