Midwest Outdoor Chasers

On this episode of The Nomadic Outdoorsman Dan talks with a group of 5 hunting buddies that make up The Midwest Outdoor Chasers about their adventures in the outdoors.

This group of guys all grew up in the rural midwest and had no choice but to be exposed to the outdoors. Some of them started shooting rabbits and squirrels while others jumped right into hunting deer. As adults and as a group they continue to pursue pretty much any and all legal game or fish animals both in their region and on long distance adventures. Dan and the guys talk about getting started in the outdoor media space, what hunting means to them and where they hope to take their channels.

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[00:00:00] All right guys. Welcome to you today's show and on the show with me today are five hunting buddies. Their names are Noah, a, Noah, b, Ben, Luke, and Ryan. And these guys make up the Midwest outdoor chasers. We're gonna be talking about everything, how they got started, what they do in the outdoor space, what they have coming up, and so much more.

It is gonna be an awesome episode. I always like having big groups of guys together on the show, so let's jump in right now. Like he was doing things that were just badass. That was one of the coolest moments of my life. I was really scared, but knowing that Dan had the gun, I did have the rifle, like we would be okay.

All right guys, welcome to today's show and joining me on the show today. I've got the Midwest Outdoor Chasers, basically is who I'm sitting here talking to. So guys, thanks [00:01:00] for joining me. Thanks for having us. Appreciate it. All right. So I gotta know, where did this idea come from? Because everybody's Hey, I want to get in the outdoor industry.

I wanna start filming my hunts. Who came up with this? And then how did everybody get involved? Okay. Yeah. My name's Noah Noah Alman. We got another Noah here too. His name's Noah Bertelsen. So you know when you hear those names no. A Nobi. Yep. No, a Noah b so yeah, so in 2016 a buddy and I, we were, he's actually not with us anymore, but I'll get to that.

2016 my buddy and I, we were, we're like let's start a page where we share pictures of what people in our community has shot. So we're. We decided to make a page. We had a few people send some stuff in of animals that they've shot, and it was all good.

And then all of a sudden more people started sending stuff, more people. And then we got bigger to where we [00:02:00] started covering a whole bunch of states a bunch of different com countries. Then few, actually a few years ago my buddy actually, he called me up and he said, Hey I'm too busy to do, keep doing this no hard feelings.

And I'm like, okay. Didn't really know how I felt. I was still shocked. But. I was at that point, I was like, do I keep going with this? Do I give it up? We're not really making any movement. So I called my brother Luke. He ended up telling me, Hey, I'll do it with ya.

So I'm like, okay, great. And then I, after him and I were talking we got everybody else involved here. And I, I started out with, having two brains going at it, and then now five. At first it was different trying to, it, everything was based off of what either my buddy or I said.

And then now with everybody else, it, I didn't know how I felt about it at first, but, I've stepped back a little bit and having these guys on is, it's a blessing. We've [00:03:00] accomplished so much already within the first couple years. And we got Ben camera, guy, Noah, the star of the videos and Ryan with the humor.

But yeah, Luke's just here. Yeah Luke's here hunt. All right. He's producer. Luke does, he does coordinate a lot. The Latian Eagle. We got squirrely Luke. Yeah. But he's honestly, he's like the scheduler. He's Hey, we're gonna hunt this day. We're gonna film this day. It's just been, it's been fun, everybody has a role in some type of position in it that helps us move forward and we all compliment each other very well.

Yeah. I think we're, things are, we're some guys might lack, other guys shine and were able to pull the best out of everybody and we're all able to highlight the area that we all grew up in. For example, Noah is an amazing wild game cook. He is. That's how he got started because it's, Ryan kind of introduced me to him.

I knew him, but He was like older than me. So I knew he liked Cooking [00:04:00] Wild Game. And I approached him, I was like, Hey, how'd you feel about filming some, like cooking Wild Game for YouTube? And he was like, yeah, I've always wanted to do that. See, let's do, yeah, let's do it. So that's how we came up with Primal Plate, which our first video, which is our best video, he cooked up deer liver, and it was absolutely, it was good.

Yeah, it was fantastic. Yeah. Real good. But yeah, we've filmed that a little less than a year ago, I think it was May Yeah. Of last year. Yeah. And we didn't even post it until September. And so we have just since September just created or we've created a lot, but we've grown so much. But that, I feel like that was not, I wouldn't say a genesis moment, but that's when we really were like, we're gonna make full length videos.

Yeah. And start really working hard at making. More than just an Instagram post, like actual YouTube content, educational content stuff beyond just a [00:05:00] picture of someone with a nice deer or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a, we're not like a meat eater, like type of level, but we're that bridge of like a smaller content creator that just enjoys being in the outdoors, enjoys just showing the true moments of the outdoors and trying to bridge that gap from like a YouTuber to like a Netflix meat eater series and trying to balance it with humor and education.

Yeah. Yeah. And the nice thing is like when you get a group of guys together, like what you guys have formed here, there's no limit to the production value of that. Like you said, you've got all of your different parts that you play. You've got the comedy, you've got the education, you've got Luke who's just there.

You guys are ready to go. Hey, I'm a good shot. All right. I dunno about that. Seen run away from you. You guys have to have bets going consistently, right? Who catches the biggest fish? Who's the better shot? Or do [00:06:00] you guys not compete like that? Like how many times Luke's gonna get worked up?

Yeah, he get, gets worked up and then half hour later he is I still feel good about today. Yeah. Mr. Optimism, there's an over under on the Mr. Optimism. We were just up in Minnesota ice fishing. Oh. I don't know if I should it's a little embarrassing because we were up there in September.

And had some of the best luck we've ever had, like fishing, like incredible. We were limited out almost by the like, end of the morning. So we're like the same lakes. We're like, all right, this is gonna be a great time. We partnered with Hummingbird and they sent us some products, so we're like, we got a nice fish finder and everything.

So we would, we're like, first day we kinda just took it as a test day. Second day we're like, all right, we're gonna hit it hard. We're gonna be ready to get on the ice, get some fish, and we would wash the fish, come up to the lure. We would then wash them, turn around and swim right back away. And we left.

We were probably on the ice for what, 36 hours? At least three or four days we [00:07:00] were there. Oh. And we left with a three inch minnow. And my smallest small I ever seen. It was just, we had one blue gill though. Yes, it was heartbreaking. Don't forget about blue and you just, you sit there. And if you're jigging or whatever, you see it come in, so you don't wanna stop jigging, cuz obviously you're attracting it in, so you're like, okay, I'm not gonna change anything.

I'm not gonna change anything comes up. You feel a little nibble and then just swims off. And it was so disheartening. Oh yeah. And it's crazy now that. You almost want to go back to the simple fish finder that you have before because then you don't know. What's that one? Yeah. Now you can see all these giant ass streaks coming across.

So you're lure and then gone. Yeah. The live, see, that's the thing. When you know they're there and you're not catching 'em, it makes you feel like a terrible fisherman. Oh yeah. Same thing with deer. If you're getting deer all the time on trail camera, but you can't get an arrow in one, you're like, dude, I suck at this.

Whereas if you don't know that they're not there, it's just oh, [00:08:00] there's no deer around here. Yeah. We tried wax worms minnows, lures, jigs. We went and bought a lot of stuff from Fleet Farm just to try everything because we were like, we're gonna catch something. Yeah. I think at one point we had five or six different poles in the water with a different lure or a mixture of something on, and there would be a fish that would go straight past.

We threw protein bars down as facial. We were trying, see, that's the thing. They were full from that stuff, so they just, they didn't want any of your real bait. And with Ben being there, he's crazy when it comes to trying to get the best shot ever. He has a GoPro. It's the newest GoPro decides to tie fishing line to it and drops it through the hole to get to the bottom to see if he could see any of the fish.

He saw one. Walleye obviously wasn't biting our pole. This man's crazy when it comes to that wedding. Dude. I love that idea. Did you like Bluetooth it to your phone so you could see it live? Or did you have to look at the footage after? We had to [00:09:00] look at it after. It was just a little too deep for that, but Okay.

It was pretty cool to see something totally different. So yeah, he's, you'd imagine putting that down there and seeing like something wild, just like a freak animal. You've never seen her like a body or a vehicle grain? So we were there back in September, or actually we were there back in June and in the same bay that we were fishing in, when we were ice fishing, we saw a Musky go by.

That tail was the size of my head, and so we knew that it was in that same area, like it's probably in that area somewhere. And so I was just waiting for it to just go by. Yeah. And I was like, yeah, I remember. We were on the boat. Like my biggest thing, I haven't caught a Musky yet. I've had a Musky on the line, but didn't get it in the boat.

Yeah. And, so I just have this ultimate goal to catch me a Musky. So my brother, last year in, in June, we were up there and this was the big Musky and my brother's reeling in and I didn't know what to say. And then he just [00:10:00] started fumbling his words. He's musky. And I look over and I, my jaw dropped.

This was the biggest fish that I have seen with my eyes from freshwater. It was, five years ago, somebody caught a 44 inch Musky up there and, this is everything. Oh yeah. It makes you think. How big, really? Like how big was that? Because it was definitely the size of my body.

It was probably huge. Oh, theys bigger. Every time they hear about it feel bad. It's huge, man. Yeah, dude, that's what we do. Every time a bird gets away like a duck. If we sh if a single comes in and somehow we miss it, we're all like, dude, that one was double banded. It was double banded.

Yep yep. The one that got away, y you heard the ting, but no, nothing dropped. Yep. Yeah, exactly. So how do you guys decide these trips? Luke, I know they said you're producer scheduler, so who comes up with this stuff? Yeah, so basically I'm thinking like, oh what season is in right now?

So like right now it's Cayo. So we've been [00:11:00] doing a lot of that. And then it's also snow Geese Goose season happening right now. Yeah. Which we need to get out and try, but just been busy with other things. But depends on what season it is. And just coordinating and making sure that Ben can be here cuz he lives in central Nebraska and coordinating with all of us guys.

Yep. When we can all be there and then we'll go off of that schedule. It's a lot of coordination, but I enjoy it. If they're not going, I'm going. Yeah. And I don't like going by myself, yeah. It's kinda like we talked earlier, like we just, we wanna do it all. So it's like, what can we realistically do?

Like we, we had someone take us coon hunting with a dog a month or two ago, which was way cool experience. None of us have coon hunted over a dog. And it was just this local kid that we know that always likes our videos. And we asked them to take us and he was super happy. And so there's just an opportunity we took and if we go snow goose hunting, it's gonna probably be a similar situation where we just find someone willing to take us.

But then we also have each of our [00:12:00] own things that we're most interested in. Like the coyotes, like I've always loved coyo hunting. I've got a lot invested into it with thermal scopes and stuff. So we've been getting into that. We spent a lot of time catfishing on the river this summer I bought a boat cuz I like catfish too.

And so it's just kind. Whatever we're all interested in. Noah loves to waterfowl and so I don't even know if I water. I think we went one, you and me went two hunting one time was all the waterfowling I did with you this year. Just cuz it's, that's not really my strong suit. Not that I don't like it.

It's just like you, that's a time commitment. Yeah. A lot of money too. Yeah. Yeah. But I think that's what really how the page is really taken on a mind of its own and how you have five or six different minds with all five or six different passions within the same community and the same passion.

You really get to highlight everything that goes on in our area. There's a lot of people that really want to get out to big game hunt, but financially it's just not, it's not viable for some people to get these outta state tags. So it's, [00:13:00] what we try to do is try to highlight everything that's available for the average Joe in southwest Iowa or within the Midwest itself, to, to be able to go out and enjoy, there used to be these you have deer season in the fall.

And then it was dead season from December until September started hitting. And now we've got to the point where we're Turkey hunting in the spring. We're cat fishing, we're bow fishing in the summertime. We're doing all sorts of waterfowl hunting. We're gonna try and get, start getting into goose hunting.

So it's something that we've able been able to really highlight a ton of different aspects of. And I think everybody here has something they love just a little bit more in the hunting field that we can all talk on. And it's really helped with building Midwest outdoor chasers.

And I feel like you notice that in, in hunting media all over the place right now. It used to be you'd see guys and they'd be the whitetail guys, you'd see the other guys, they'd be the waterfowl guys. And now, even look at Lee and Tiffany, they're going out and doing Kodiak hunts.

[00:14:00] They're going out and elk hunting their mule deer hunting. And it's not obviously the bulk of their content is always gonna be monster whitetail. But you see them branching out, meat eater, same thing. It's like they're highlighting all of these different things. And that's where me as a podcaster, I was like, I don't, everyone's you gotta pick something.

You gotta pick something to be like your thing. If you wanna be the walleye guy, if you wanna be the waterfowl guy, if you want to be the Turkey guy. And I'm like, I'm not that though. I'm not gonna do that. And they're like, dude, I'm telling you it's not gonna work unless you do this. And I was like I'm gonna try it anyways because I'm not gonna give up everything else just at Turkey hunt.

Like I would, there's nothing that I'm that passionate about to where I'd shelf everything else just to pursue it. And that's when I started saying, listen, we cover everything from frog gigging to moose hunting. And people are like, this is awesome. Yeah. I'm like, if you would've told me I was gonna do that when I was a kid, I'd be like, I don't even know what a frog.

I knew what a frog was, but as far as [00:15:00] edible frogs, no idea. Yeah. I think for us too is we really wanna celebrate. The Midwest where we live people think it's, a lot of flyover states and granted, yeah, the mountains are amazing and we don't have that. Our oceans are awesome, but there's a lot of really cool stuff to be done here.

Like our d n R in Iowa is awesome. I think with the habitat that they put in. And so there's a lot of opportunity here that we want to showcase. Like Luke and I went and caught a turtle last summer, so we could show cooking it up on our, for our cooking videos. We have this idea like a hashtag, what are we gonna call, called Lost Life.

We have some shirts that we sell on our website. This is where in the Lus Hills, which are unique to our area. So we just wanna like celebr. Here, corn fields and muddy rivers and whatever. But to us it's it's our favorite thing. Yeah. And it, it really does help that. We've all been here our whole lives.

I've known Noah, I've known No, both Noah's and Luke since I was a [00:16:00] kid, and been Ben's come on in the last four or five years. But it's just, it's really cool to be able to share the lifestyle with a bunch of guys that you've known your whole life and someone that, that can capture it to a tee too.

Having been here has been able to to articulate exactly what we do and the lifestyle that the Midwest brings. And it's been a lot of fun to, to showcase that through some of the videos that we've done. And not only being serious in, chasing large animals or the biggest fish or the biggest bird banded, burns, whatever.

It's to show that, you don't have to have. All the sponsors and the money to go out and enjoy the outdoors. Yeah. And you gotta get creative with the content you share and the entertainment side of it when you spend 36 hours on the ice and catch a three inch minnow.

So it, it's like you gotta have some people who can tell stories. Yeah. There was a lot of stories told, there was a lot of beer drinking, a lot of stories told. Yeah. Lot of laughs though. So it was still a good trip. It was. I enjoyed that [00:17:00] trip. We didn't catch anything, but I'm gonna remember that trip for the rest of my life.

I think that goes to the heart of like, why we're in it. It's because we're not here just to kill the animals. We're not here just to get the biggest creature that's out in the forest or on in the water is we're here for the memories, we're here for our stories and for truly just soaking in the earth that we're on and the beauty of what God's created.

Yeah. Sorry. Yeah, I'll say, I think for all of us yeah, we, knocking an animal over is awesome, but like we, we do it to connect to nature to take part in like the natural cycle. And that's why we do the cooking thing to show like, we're not just out there just to knock bodies over.

We want to then take and take that deer and turn it into something really good beyond just like steaks or whatever. Yeah. Or a turtle or fish or whatever we end up cooking. Like we want to experience the whole cycle of going out [00:18:00] into the wild and taking something and turning it into something that keeps us alive.

Obviously you don't need to eat wild game to stay alive, but in reality that's what, on some level what we're doing is. Getting our own food and taking part of that natural cycle. Yeah. Reconnecting to the roots. Yeah. I think it's been going on for since the beginning of time. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It's been really fun to tell that story. It's with Primal Plate, we've been able to keep it full circle and keeping it as, as lighthearted as we can with, not going out to to fill the walls, but to fill the freezer, and to show that a sustenance lifestyle with, within the outdoors is fully capable.

It's enjoyable for us and we'd like to portray that as best we can. Yeah. It's cool to get out there and connect to creation, and I tell people that all the time, like when you. [00:19:00] When you go from being a camper or a hiker or whatever to someone who's out there pursuing game animals, whether it's fish or upland birds or big big game, like you are becoming part of the food chain.

You're not, you're no longer an observer. That's what you do when you go out there and you just hike around or you get on a kayak, not knocking any of that stuff. I love hiking and floating and climbing and all of that, but you're an active participant in the natural order of things when you're actually out there catching your food, forging, killing animals, like it adds a whole different element.

And Luke, like what you were saying, we've been doing it since the beginning of time. I have people all the time asking me like, what is it about this? You're obsessed. And I'm like, I think most people would be if they got the taste for it, like if they just went out and experienced it, because it's in all of our blood.

Aside from. Procreating hunting and fishing and gathering is the longest [00:20:00] standing tradition of human beings. Like we've been doing it forever. And so once you get the taste of it, that's why people get hooked so quickly. People getting into it in their thirties and all of a sudden, like they sell everything else that they have.

They're like, oh, I don't need this anymore. I don't need to go golfing anymore. I'm gonna buy as many shotguns and rifles and bows and pistols and, the nicest tent. The nicest backpack. Yeah. Because it's in us, it's in everybody. And aside from those making political statements, like they're, they'd never admit to it.

But there's that little bit of it in all of us. That's that's how we have our name Midwest Outdoor Chasers. Like a lot of people, they ask us, Where'd you get that name? And it's more, the chasers part is, chasing the outdoors like that is just what we love to do.

You ch you chase the outdoors, meaning you chase the adrenaline you chase the thrill. It's just chasers is just like a bigger word for Yeah. Covers a bunch of things for us. You are chasing game, but you're chasing a lot more than that. Yes. Yeah. And [00:21:00] I think you're exactly right, Dan.

I think it is in all of us. I can't tell you how many times I've been out, freezing or roasting in the sun or just suffering and thinking, what am I doing? Like I would be so much money ahead to just buy my meat from the grocery store. Yeah. But it's I can't not do this. Yeah. I just can't not do it.

I would never be happy. I would never be satisfied. It's like to me, going hunting feels emotionally as important as going to work. It's like you just have to, I have to do it to be who I am. Yeah. I would be denying that to stay happy. Yeah. It's kinda my therapy too. Yeah. Kind gets you out of, it's surpassed that, that notion of being a passion at this point.

Yeah. It's it's an instinct. It's a lifestyle that, that just comes naturally. It's, you talk to a bunch of people that have never been, never done it, they've never hunted and they don't quite understand where the happiness lies in it. And it's not so much as a happiness, it's just more of a [00:22:00] satisfaction.

It's a satisfaction. It's where you were meant to be, it's providing for yourself, it's providing for your family, and it's also a way to connect back to your roots. It's, it really is. It's, you can just tell, like whenever we go out hunting, every one of us are in the best mood.

Yeah. It can be three o'clock in the morning. Yeah. It's just, it's fun. You get up early. You either shoot something or you don't. Either way we're still happy. Yeah. Yeah. We're leaving with memories. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's all, yeah it's pretty crazy. The just that level of excite just the way your mood changes all together when you're out there.

And it's funny cuz my wife comments on that all the time I get home or like my buddies wives will be like, dude, why do you let him go hunting so much? And she's he's a different person when he comes home. He comes back so happy, so excited, so engaged with the kids with me. And not that I'm like a total D bag all the other times, but there's something about it, it's refreshing and then on top of that, the opportunity to bring home food.[00:23:00]

It hurts me when I buy a steak at the store. I haven't bought a steak from the store in a long time. We'll still buy meat, like certain types of meat here and there. But the steak man, I'm like, dude, I. I, I should have killed more this year. Like I could have that already. I shouldn't be buying this from the store.

And it's crazy, the, like the want you have for game meat once you've started eating it. Like I grew up, like my my old man we would, shoot a couple deer in the fall and we'd eat occasionally on some ground or some loins that we'd taken off of it throughout the year, or they'd cut it with beef.

But we would buy a half a cow every year and we would have hamburger steaks and roast for throughout the entire year. And these last two years, I've taken enough deer in the fall to where I could eat on pretty much exclusively just whitetail for, six months straight. And we just bought a cow here not too long ago.

And the mouth feel is just off once you go back to beef, it's just your pallet kind of adapts back to [00:24:00] that gaminess and that leanness to where beef just has a off taste now. It's not, it's fatty. It's. It just feels heavier once you get back into that game meet style.

It's it's, I, it's hard to explain, man. It really is. And you don't know where that meet's been either. No. Yeah. You know that deer was sitting underneath that oak tree when you shot it? Yeah. Yeah. That mean that, living in the Midwest and in Missouri too, not that's not the Midwest, but living here, you drive by a feed lot where there's 500, a thousand head of cattle standing in six inches of shit.

And and that you're going to eat that that deer when I shot it was standing in, some grass or whatever, and it's just way cleaner people. My wife works in the city and like she'll tell her coworkers how we eat a lot of wild games. They're like, that's disgusting. How do you eat that?

Blah, blah. And it's this is way better than what you're eating, guaranteed. Oh, yeah. Oh.

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And you see that with the new generation that's just getting at like high school, there's a lot of people who have that interest in eating clean food. And you see a lot of people like I was listening to the Meat eater, I don't know if it was the trivia or an actual episode the other day, but they were talking about the bottom of the horseshoe, right?

You've got like the extreme right? You've got the extreme left, and then at the bottom of the horseshoe you've got all of these super redneck rancher dudes who are like, government can't tell me what to do. And all the super far left people are like, yeah, they can't tell me what to do either. And it's oh, we hate that processed food from the store.

Hey, so do we. And there's like this commonality at the bottom of the horseshoe and [00:27:00] it's interesting to see there's people. That I knew in high school and college that I would've never guessed would hunt. And all of a sudden they're like, man, I got into hunting, man. It's just a great food source.

It's fun being out there. And I'm like, dude, you used to hate guns. I had a roommate, in fact, right after college, and it was funny. He, we had four dudes that lived in a one bedroom apartment. My brother slept on the couch, he slept on the futon. Another guy slept in an unfinished basement downstairs that flooded every time it rained.

And then I got the only bedroom. And the one guy, Brian he came up to me one day, I was cleaning my shotgun, getting ready for waterfowl season. And he goes, Hey man, any way you could put that, any way you could put that away? It makes me nervous that you have that out. And I'm like, hell no.

I'm not putting this away. This is my apartment, man. I'm gonna clean my shotgun right here in this chair. Years later, he messages me, he's Hey man, I'm a guide up in Alaska. [00:28:00] And I was like, what? He's yeah, dude, I've been working for this guiding outfit for the last two seasons. He's I'm probably gonna go back again this year.

He's I only do it for a few months of the year, but it's awesome. Like we specialize in grizzly and moose. And I'm like, who are you, man? You're not the same person. I don't know what you're talking about. In that same vein, is the amount of revenue hunting generates to go back into conservation?

Yeah. Yeah. Like I have a it's my cousin's wife God lover, but we see things a little bit differently and talking about recycling once, and she got uppity. But anyways I didn't say it at the time, but I was like, I was doing the math. I'm like, I bought tags and licensed in Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, and Iowa that year.

I spent like a couple thousand dollars that went right back into conservation. Not to mention the, what is that, the Pittman Robertson tax or whatever Yeah. On shooting goods that goes back into conservation. And I'm just like, I [00:29:00] know there's no way she's given nearly as much money back into the environment as I have.

Sorry I tossed the occasional water bottle. Anyways, we get you for that. Yeah, I know. And that's the thing about hunting is a lot of people don't understand that a lot of this money's going right back into the population and stuff. Yeah. It's for all these, and if you look at the stats from like the sixties, I just saw a graphic this past week and all the hunting game and waterfowl and Turkey and deer, the population's drastically higher than what it was in the sixties.

Oh yeah. We're lucky that we get to sit here and have a season at this point. There was a time in the 19 hundreds where. Virtually everybody was going out and taking all sorts of game out of the fields and the, through conservation efforts and a hell of a lot of commitment these agencies were able to bring back the Turkey populations and the deer populations and pheasant.

And it's been really [00:30:00] great to see that, you might spend another $2 on your license every year or every other year, but because of that, you're able to go out and utilize public ground and you're able to get better funding for some of these game agencies that, that are, that have the same exact mindset that you have.

And they're out there because they wanna see these populations of animal flourish and to continue with the hunting season seasons. In reality then we put a premium on these wild animals was to hunt. It's not so that, the occasional hiker can observe them. It's was so we can hunt them.

So it's I think some ignorant people have the idea that hunters want to eliminate animals off the landscape, which is the exact opposite of what we want to do. We want as much as there possibly can be so that we can go take a few here and there. Yeah. And so that's, people who don't understand hunting, they don't get that and the good that hunting does for the environment.

Yeah. And I've had a good amount of people come into my house and they'll see the deer heads, the Turkey fans on the [00:31:00] wall and they'll say, is that the only reason that you guys go out is because you guys wanna fill wall space? And, if I do get to feel wall space that's fantastic.

That's great. That's what I want to do. But at the same time, they're not looking on the back end. And that one deer, provided for my family for two months and it's. It's a full circle thing. It's, we're not out there cuz we enjoy killing, we're out there because we enjoy being reconnected to where we all came from.

I, I think it's cool to, it's cool to hunt with people that haven't been out there before and they might have this preconceived idea of what a hunter is. Like we're all blood thirsty. Rednecks wearing confederate flag tuxedos out there, firing ar fifteens into crowds of every animal we can see, right?

There's people who actually have this wild mo thought of what we are as hunters. And then you go out there with some people I try to, I make it a point to hunt with 20 new people each year. And a lot of these people are like, holy cow. This is crazy. This [00:32:00] is this is spiritual almost.

And I'm like, yeah, it is a hundred percent. I'm not out here. I sit, I watch more animals than I shoot every year. And sitting there and connecting and being like, oh, hey, check this out. Like here's a, here's an armadillo walking through the field. W I don't know why I chose an armadillo. I do see them quite a bit down here in Missouri.

Like you'll see an animal and you're like, Hey, that's pretty cool. This spring I saw a river Otter never saw one in this area at all. In fact, it was the tiniest little creek next to where I was Turkey hunting. And I was like, man, that is the coolest thing. And when you can share those experiences with people, they're like, dude, you have a reverence for these animals and for the outdoors that I didn't know existed.

And I'm like, you could go to almost any county in the country, find some redneck dude, and you'll watch him have that same experience, have that same reverence for the animal for the outdoors. It's not a blood thirst. Yeah, it's exciting. Yeah. The adrenaline's pumping. Yeah. [00:33:00] We might hoot and holler when we shoot something.

But at the end of the day, it is so much more than that trigger pull in the animal dying. Yeah. And I think, back to the, the point you made about people walking in and being like, is that all you do? And, it's every, every animal that you have, on the walls it tells a story.

Like you will remember the exact story to that animal. Yeah. And you get, you get a big hunter walking in, they're gonna be like, oh, that's a nice deer. What's the story behind this one? And it's it's a way to reconnect yourself with that animal. Oh, yeah. It's better than just, taking the meat, throwing it out.

Yeah. You're actually displaying like, Hey this is my trophy. Yeah. I, it's you're celebrating the animals that, that you like. Exactly. Yeah. I mean it's, they call it trophy hunting and trophy's kind of a. A loose term. It's a celebration. It's a it's problem. Ament. It's a memento.

Yeah. There we go. Tm, pat and pen. It, it'd be the equivalent of you walking into one of their [00:34:00] houses and seeing a picture of them with their kids at Disneyland and being like, what? You only went to Disneyland so you could have a picture on the wall? And they're like, no. Like we went there for the memories.

We went there to build a relationship with our kids. We went there to relax and it's that's what this skull is. That's what this shoulder mount is. That's what this taxidermy is like. It is just a memory and a tangible thing long after the meat scum that I can still walk past, I can touch, I can show my friends and be like, Hey, this is the story.

And that's all it is. And yeah, some people there's bad apples in every bunch, right? There's people out there who are just terrible for the environment, terrible for wildlife, and. Their whole goal is to just kill everything. And there's poaching rings that are busted every year. So I'm not saying that there aren't those people out there, but it makes a very small percentage of hunters.

That small percentage is unfortunately what gets highlighted. Yeah. Yeah. So it's puts a bad taste in everybody's mouth. It [00:35:00] does. And I dunno about you, but it's, it seems like in the last few years it's started to become a little bit more acceptable, and I don't know if acceptable is the right word to use, but it's become a lot more that poach is acceptable or hunting is acceptable.

Not poaching. Okay. Not poaching that the outdoor lifestyle, that hunting is a little bit more. In, not mainstream, but it's a little bit more well known than I better understood. Yeah. And I don't think you're necessarily, at least in our part of the world we definitely make up a very small demographic of the entirety of the country.

We live in a very rural setting, 20 minutes from a small city, but a but far enough away to where you're pretty secluded and you the community that we've grown up in it's pretty accepting. It's a way of life for most families around here. It's hard pressed not to find some, someone living in the community that doesn't have some connection to hunting, fishing, or whatever.

But I do think that, [00:36:00] thanks to the introduction of podcasts like this meat eater and all sorts of other big name individuals that are making it a little bit, Artistic it's helped to alleviate that bridge that's been gapped for so long because it was either you're an asshole or you're a non hunter and there's no in between.

And now it's a little bit more there. There's a smaller gap there. I think I heard a well, and like you guys said, it's more of you guys are highlighting the story, you're telling stories. That's what you're doing and it's not just about the kill. Yeah. Yeah. I heard a stat, I think on the metered podcast where it was something like, I don't know, less than 10% of the American population hunts, but it has over 90% people are okay with it.

And so I think a lot, most people do understand what's going on, but I also think there's been a shift. In my lifetime in the last 20 years away from trophy hunting to the story, the conservation [00:37:00] aspect of it. Like even if you just look at outdoor television like 20 years ago versus now, where like all they were doing is knocking over big bucks and big elk and whatever.

And no one's shooting do, no one's shooting cows. It's all about the biggest and they're never getting skunked. Or if they get skunked that does not get aired. And now they tell like the real story. Yeah. And what, what's actually going on? And I think that intrigues people a lot more.

My father-in-law has no aspiration to hunt. He loves watching meat eater. He'll, like when it, they drop the new epi, new season on Netflix. He's texting me. He's did you see meat eater yet? And so I. People can relate to that even if they don't hunt. Yeah. I think for us that's where it goes into, like where we also started Big Horn Productions is the creative side of it.

I have a very creative background in photo and video and that kind of content creation, and so with getting connected with these guys, like my [00:38:00] background in. Like my dad did hunt when I was younger and like I was always in the outdoors when I was a kid, but I didn't just grow up hunting. Like we, my parents lived in the middle of York, which is the town that I'm in.

But we didn't have any hunting ground. We didn't do much in the outdoors, but like my grandparents owned farmland. I was always on the farm if I could be, and like always in the woods and everything of that extent. And so then as I grew up through life and everything, and then I had a previous job that was mostly focused on sports and taught me how to be very reaction or have a very quick reaction time with capturing these moments.

That only happened for once in a lifetime. And then I stepped away from that job and got in with these guys and so it was. I was in a transitional period of what do I wanna do? Where's the Lord leading me in this? And then met up with these guys and that first hunt was I'd already [00:39:00] been out waterfowl hunting once or twice before that.

But seeing the atmosphere, the group, the camaraderie, and the memories and the joy that it brought, even though it was like we're suffering out in the freezing coldest three degrees, knowing in a blizzard. But we were all having a great time. Yeah. And go ahead. After, seeing that first video that he made of us, it was like, it just felt so weird, but in my head I'm thinking we better not scare this guy off.

Yeah. So I think that's where. Now where we're at is like we had Midwest Outdoor chasers. We are obviously wanting to capture that memory and then it developed into also Bitcoin productions. Whereas's now, like we, we capture it full spectrum with like companies and brands, but we're also then capturing the moments in the memories that we're experiencing just an everyday life.

And so it's a cool dynamic of both sides of the spectrum. But so with him [00:40:00] being on the camera, that doesn't mean he's a bad shot because we went out into Sandhills in Nebraska with my cousin. Yeah. To hunt mallards. And this boy put down, we limited out and he had his license. Yeah. Just because he is if we limit out, I'll shoot.

He put down the camera after we limited out. I'm not kidding. He probably missed twice and he limited it. Oh boy. Geez. He. What was five mallards? This dude is a good shot, yeah. Cuz he's always putting the camera right on. Yeah. He's got he's, no dude I'm curious about this now because my buddy Tony, he's a videographer and he's done all kinds of big things, but best shot that I know.

And for real, he's a, he's an amazing shot. My other buddy Isaac, really good shot, also a videographer. And so I'm curious now need, we need to do like a, like the hunter versus the cameraman. Yeah. Just [00:41:00] do a side by side shootout. The outcome of that. What do you know we're, you might hand us the camera.

We're okay. You're fired. We're us videographers, photographers, we're still tracking with you guys as you guys are tracking with a rifle. And so it's the same movement. We're just, we're pulling a different trigger, capturing that moment. That's cool. Oh man. I try to film stuff and it doesn't go well.

Like I think about the what it takes to actually get that animal on camera. Not only you have to track it, get it set up, the camera's set up. If you're self filming, especially get it set up to where you get it in frame with the shot, then you have to immediately go from oh my gosh, I just shot this animal to you.

Nope. Gotta grab the camera, track the animal again, watch it, go through the woods, do whatever. And I'm. I don't know how these guys do it. Like I really don't roller, I'm trying to film my nephew. The only difference for Ben with the [00:42:00] cameras, it has no recoil. That's a question. Yeah, there you go. That's a good point.

But I can't imagine how much practice, how much experience it takes to be good at that. Exactly what you're saying, tracking that animal or like watching a bird, and then all of a sudden, boom, it gets shot out of the sky and then you're following it down till it hits the water. I'm like, you guys are wizards, man.

You know that, you know how sometimes, you p you pull up your binos and you're like moving it around a little bit to see where the animal is. Yeah, the same thing. You got a scope on your gun, you just pull right up. There's A1 buy with him with the camera.

He's got his little screen. He's gotta put it right on him. So he is already pointing right at the animal. And he is the best eye sometimes too. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. For the time he's oh, there's a Kyle. Yeah, there's a deer. Yeah, there's whatever we're after. Heck, you guys almost got ran over to the other don't put another gun.

You can't say anything, not be cameraman. He's there's right by that billboard over there. And I'm like, what? Billboard?[00:43:00]

That's good. My wife always gives me a hard time about that. Like the other day I was driving, we were driving back from South Carolina and there were two deer about, they probably were eight or 900 yards back in this. And I'm like, oh, there's a couple deer. And she's I don't get it. I don't understand.

I told you to grab this out of the bathroom for me the other day and you couldn't find it. And it was sitting right on the counter and now you can see a deer while you're driving 75 miles an hour at 800 yards. I'm like yeah. I guess I don't really care about, your razor on the counter, who's had your priority straight, yeah, exactly. Yeah. This, that's gonna bring me food. Picking up your makeup bag off the counter. Doesn't do anything for me. And it's gonna bring her food too. What? Arrange Yeah, exactly that for you. You should be thanking me that I'm good at this. Yeah, I'm gonna let you tell her that. I'm gonna stick outta that one.

Oh no. This is coming straight from you guys. I'm gonna edit this. You guys don't know is I'm really good with Photoshop and [00:44:00] post-production. No. So it's gonna be your mouth saying all of these things. Some deep. Yeah. All right guys. If you've been listening to the podcast, I'm sure you've heard me talk about the helicopter hog hunt that I did down in Texas.

Now, I went down there with rope Texan Outfitters and Landon and Brandon, the owners put us on the animals. We killed 150 pigs in 19 coyotes, just from the air. On top of that. We went out thermal hunting at night and got up close and personal to more hogs. I didn't have to worry about bringing guns or ammunition because all of that was provided for me, and it is to this day, the most action packed day of hunting I've ever had.

I stand by what I've said in the past, and that's that helicopter hog hunting is the funnest thing that you can do with pants on. In addition, they offer Sandhill crane hunts, and predator calling. So if you're looking for the most exciting hunt of your life in something that you're gonna want to come back and do year after year, go check out rogue texan.com and book your hunt today.[00:45:00]

What do you guys have coming up? It's going cow hunting tonight. We've gotten a couple kills on camera, so we'll be putting that video together pretty soon I would imagine. Snow goose, hopefully. Then Turkey coming up this spring. Probably at least three. Are you getting Turkey tags? Yep. So four of us will have Turkey tags, so do some filming of that.

Probably some catfish ones. Yeah catfish. Summertime, both fishing. Yep. We have some new series that we'll probably try to be working on the channel, so that's exciting to be in development for that. So hopefully those will release here soon. Yep. Keeping em up with the primal plate.

Yeah, definitely With the cooking video and the cooking aspect side of it. We got some in the oven already. The, it's funny how you pun tone. Yeah. It's funny how this filming everything you do works because Just because we have the videos out now doesn't mean that's the only stuff we have.

Like we have 15 videos we can make, but [00:46:00] we want to keep on putting videos into the arsenal so when there are those slow times you can put like a primal plate out and stuff. Like when you spend 36 hours on the ice and don't catch anything. Yeah, you put so Exactly. And hopefully Turkey tur, I'm excited for Turkey cuz last year him and I went out and we actually have a film of us getting a double and it was crazy.

They ran in so long story short, they were 300 yards away and on each side of my Loves the story. Yeah. On each side of my strutting Tom decoy, I put screws into it and then put fishing line on both sides so I can roll that out. I love it man. Redneck engineering and I would move that back and forth.

Little they came running in. Come here big. I've never seen turkeys run that fast from 300 yards away. Oh yeah. It was impressive. We actually got what, [00:47:00] close to 400,000 views on Instagram, because we put it to the the office. The office, when they're doing CPR or when the, there's a fire.

Oh, yeah. It's happening. It's happening. It's happening. Yeah, man. You had the first twerk in Tom. Yeah. That's awesome, dude. Put that on TikTok. Yeah. Yeah. Tom twerk in Luke, but yeah, no I don't know. So I'm excited for Turkey hunting. Yeah, I Turkey. I think Turkey season's gonna be pretty promising it in the last few years.

It's seemed like the Turkey numbers have been lacking, at least when we've been out. Cuz I'll do late season muzzle odor here in Iowa and I know Noah does too. And it just seems like this last year I've seen more turkeys than I have in the last 10 years. So it's super promising for the spring to come up.

I think we're gonna have a lot of luck. So we got some honey holes now picked out. I'm seeing some big beards too. Yeah. Yeah. And I've already seen 'em start the strut too, so I'm getting I'm getting antsy. Yeah, I just got a couple on camera [00:48:00] yesterday. They came through at 10:00 AM and I was like, dude, those are some ropes I've been seeing.

Like you said, a ton of birds. Yeah. Yeah. And it's crazy cuz if you actually look at the numbers it shows that Turkey numbers are down all over the place. Yep. But for some reason when I talk to people, they're like, dude, there's turkeys everywhere. There's turkeys everywhere. So I don't know what it is.

I don't know where that disconnect is. You're really starting to see some of those flocks of 20 plus that are out in the fields rather than the one or two, maybe five stragglers that you're seeing. It's there's, I think I saw a group of 50, the other one. Yeah. I mean it's, we were out for a shoot here just recently and it was end of December and we saw a group of 50 plus just chilling, and then we were back out a few weeks later and we we pulled up to this field that we hunt and we got out of the truck and they were just up chilling about 450 yards out and didn't have any cares in the world.

[00:49:00] There were probably 20 of them just sitting there. Yeah. Dumb bird. Until you gotta kill 'em. Yeah. Yeah. They know it. All animals know I had a bird. I wasn't even hunting anymore. I was walking out of the woods, but I was almost back to the house. This bird was two properties away and saw me walking through the field and took off running.

I watched it sprint, like a freaking velociraptor across that field, and I'm like, dude, what? I'm not even I'm not even going towards it either. I'm like walking quartering away from it and I just happened to see it and it was booking it. It's definitely interesting how animals react because we've been out Kyle hunting up quite a bit this year.

Yeah. And it has we have we've had decent luck. We've gotten a few pilots so far, but we were out Sunday night and first property, we sat like nothing. It was dead silent. Wind was heavy. We went to the next [00:50:00] property, wind was dead still. We were, we went to the bottom of this terrace originally and had the call, probably 25 yards out to our right.

Everything. And then we were like, all right, let's move up to the top of the terrace. And it was freshly dug out from behind. So there was like a pretty good dip behind it. Hit us really well. Like only our heads were above the terrace, so it was like perfect. Like hiding. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm sitting there and I got the camera.

I'm like trying to get a different angle, a different shot while we're waiting. And I just hear this rustling off to my left and it was down below the terrace and I was like, what is that? Is that like just a field mouse running is it's something, but I didn't know what it was and I like peek over and I just see this creature go darting past at top speed.

And I was like, what in the world? And in the matter of three seconds, I made out, that was a Kyle. It hit the call, turned around, started coming right at us. I turned to Noah. I'm like, Hey, like to your right. And like it's within eight to 12 foot. It was not that [00:51:00] calm. Yeah. No. Like I saw in the back like by the time I had time to process it and see what it was, it had time to hit the call and it was coming right at us.

It was actually three of 'em. Yes. In. He's what was that? And I look and like I see three shadows and then they went behind the terrace and I like sprint up, leaning over the terrace and they're trotting off. And I howled with my mouth in. One stopped and I shot it and the other two booked it out of there.

But like they just came charging it and snuck underneath of us until they figured out what the call was and then they were getting out of there. It was, yeah, it was cool. It was like I, it was one of the first times like Kyle hunting that I've ever had that happen. And then the rest of the night was just like electric with different calls, was seeing them.

There was a certain point at 12:00 AM we probably had 15 to 20 just around us, like full 360 Kyle calls just going off just like a group in every direction howling at us. It was nuts. Geez. It was [00:52:00] super cool. So it's one of those things that like, you're definitely on high alert after that because like we're both looking through thermal scopes and you're not paying attention to what's right underneath your nose.

And then all of a sudden something pops up in your lap and you're like, oh, alright. We gotta be aware. Dang. That's awesome. We're coming up on time, but we do have a little, we've got about 10 minutes left of this one and I think it'd be cool. I don't think I've ever asked this question in a group setting like this, but we're gonna go around and say, if there is one thing you could hunt, top of the bucket list, what's the species location and weapon you're using?

Ooh. Oh, I've got it. You're up. I I've always had the pipe dream of doing a big horn ram hunt. I honestly don't have a location that I would be ideal. I've always loved col, I've hunted in Colorado, but I've always loved Colorado and Wyoming. [00:53:00] I'd love to draw there and it's, that's a terrible pipe stream because those tags are so hard to come by.

But I shot my first elk with my grandpa's seven mag and I would like to take that along with me dang. That'd be cool. I would that's a pipe dream that I've always wanted to do, but yeah, I do. I do a big horn with my grandpa's seven mag. I got one this camera man, you would take his camera.

I'll film myself. I got, so I got hacks. I'm a Nebraska native, so I have that lifetime tag with elk. And so putting in for that and trying and get that tag, I think would be incredible. And would be something very cool to film and document and just yeah. Be experience that. And if you get that tag, I got the guy to talk to.

Okay. Yeah. I've got a buddy who drew that Nebraska tag two years ago now, three years ago maybe. I think he shot a seven by eight. Just a monster. An [00:54:00] absolute tank. Yeah. Some of the elk in Nebraska are just beyond unbelievable. So yeah, it's

a Yukon moose. Yes. Now we're talking. That's my dream caliber. Anything to be able to kill it. So something like that. I don't know what caliber seven mill. Seven mil 3 0 8. Yeah. Some big anything. But that is my dream hunt. I've told that to my wife. I don't know since we've gotten married. That's my dream hunt.

She said, yeah, if we have money to do it. Oh, that's a big caveat. Wonder she'll surprise me. Bitch checkbook out, man. But no, that, that is my dream, huh. Hey, for real though. That's a more doable hunt than a more doable and less expensive hunt than if you were to do a moose hunt in Colorado. Yeah.

By the time you actually draw the tag, the amount of points you'd put [00:55:00] in, the amount of money you'd spend, I figured it out to where if I'm lucky and draw it in 20 years of points, bare minimum. I'm gonna be $4,500 into that hunt. And that's not counting gas, that's literally just preference points and the tag price once I draw it.

Oof. Yeah. All right. No, let's You're up. Yeah. I wanna do a hunt the caribou migration. Oh. To get, do get dropped in on float plane or whatever and hunt the, on probably rifle. I don't know. I like boat hunting. Yeah. But I'm not scared to use a rifle either. No. In that country it might be beneficial to have a rifle with you.

Yeah. I don't wanna have a giant bull at 150 yards. If I'm going up there, like I'm not gonna let 150 yards stop me. Yeah. No, but with how many caribou there are, you just lobb it and one of 'em is gonna take the arrow. You'd hit the calf behind the Yeah, that'd be my, [00:56:00] Yep. I'd probably like to shoot a red stag.

I've always thought those were pretty interesting and I think that's up there on my list. That would be I'd probably just use a 36 or something, something simple, but Yeah. Do you have a location? I don't, I just anywhere. Yep. Anywhere that has 'em, they've got Red Stag or Red Deer all over the place.

I didn't realize how common. And they are a wild animal. When you see those antlers, holy cow. Yeah. It's like a miniature elk with crazy antlers wishes that they make too. Is kinda I just thinking I think it would be sweet. Oh yeah. It's different. Everybody, they're, everybody always wants, moose, elk, but who really says I've shot a red stag.

Guys are so moose, man. Those are all great. I hope you all get to do that. And I'll probably [00:57:00] get it all. I'll probably be there filming it, so Yeah, you're gonna get to shoot everything just with a camera and then you'll get to shoot yours. You're the only one who gets to do all five of these hunts.

Yeah. Sweet. Before we hop off, where can people find you guys? Where can they connect with you on social, online, all that. Midwest Outdoor Chasers is on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook all social media stuff. Then, so we're trying and post pretty consistently for YouTube. With that we're doing full length videos as well as primal plate videos.

Instagram, it's a lot more of just a shorts fun, interactive reels, photos, documenting the story of a year of hunts of That we're going through. A new channel that we have is Big Horn Productions, which is the production side of Midwest Outdoor Chasers and also some more of our commercial work that we do.

So did you say our website? Yeah. So both have websites and then Big Horn Productions is also on Instagram. It's starting on TikTok a little bit. [00:58:00] Facebook and both play, both are really just playing hand in hand with each other. And so it's, those are probably, I don't know if I missed anything. I'd just say if you go to the Midwest Outdoor Glacier's website, you can buy a sweet shirt that, or a sweet shirt or a sweatshirt, both.

Or Yeah, we got some merch. We also have blog posts that are on our website too. Yep. We try to stay pretty consistent with blog posts. Noah's a Fanta, Noah B's a fantastic writer. Wow. So are you Ryan. He we try to stay consistent with the blog posts and Noah can take a simple hunt and make it a in-depth story.

It's we go hand in hand with educational stuff and storytelling and I think we compliment each other pretty well on that. Nice. Yeah, I'd encourage everybody to go check that out. And guys, if you're ever looking at, branch out to a different state, I know it is still technically the Midwest, so you guys want to come down and get after some game animals, catch some fish.[00:59:00]

Catch CRA ads, frog gig. I don't care what. Let me know and we'll make it happen. Let's do it. Absolutely. Just tell us when and where we'll be there.

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