Whitetail, It’s the Little Things

Hey everyone, welcome to episode 174 of the Antler Up Podcast!

On this week's episode I was joined by PA native and the 2022 Bowhunting League PA Big Buck winner Taylor Fleischer.  In this specific episode Taylor shares some of the little things that have helped him be successful the last few years, but specifically last year on the buck he was after for the last 3 years. Taylor shares the little things that can be overlooked by hunters and how to improve on what you’re already doing.  

Kicking this episode off we dive into Taylors hunting roots from when he was a young teenager.  This was a great kickoff discussion because at a  young age Taylor got the bowhunting bug and from there has worked endlessly to continue his pursuit to perfection.  This aspect I believe most hunters want to accomplish and achieve but know the process is a long fun and frustrating journey.  We discussed how some hunting experiences shaped who he is as a hunter now. The lessons learned from his past season Pope & Young buck that he plans to build upon.  Then we get into the nitty-gritty of the little things that have helped Taylor the last few seasons.  From his organization of trail cam photos, reading/understanding deer movement and behavior. We wrap up our discussion talking about how he manages his property in central PA and the challenges he faces with hunting it and hunting where he currently resides.  

 Check it out and let us know what you think!  Enjoy this fun episode and see you next week! 

Thanks again for all the support and best of luck out there and Antler Up!

Jeremy Dinsmore: [00:00:00] Welcome to the an podcast brought to you by tethered the world's best saddle hunting equipment. We have a fun show for you today.

On this week's episode, I was joined by PA Native and the 2022 Bo Hunting League pa, big Buck winner, Taylor Fleischer. In this specific episode, Taylor shares some of the little things that have helped him be successful the last few years, but specifically last year on the buck he was after for the last three years.

Taylor shares the little things that can be overlooked by hunters and how to improve on what you're already doing. To kick this episode off, we dive into Taylor's [00:01:00] hunting roots from when he was a young teenager. This was a great kickoff discussion because at a young age, Taylor got the bow hunting bug, and from there has worked endlessly to continue his pursuit to perfection.

This aspect I believe most hunters want to accomplish and achieve, but know the process is a long, fun and frustrating journey. We discussed how some hunting experiences shaped who he is as a hunter now, and the lessons learned from his past season from his pope and young buck that he plans to build upon that as well.

Then we get into the nitty gritty of all the little things that have helped tailor the last few seasons from his organization of trail camera photos, reading, understanding deer movement and deer behavior. We wrap up our discussion talking about really how he manages his property in central PA and then the challenges he faces with hunting that, and also hunting where he lives cuz very similar to me where I live in central PA and hunt a lot back in northeast pa.

So we get a lot into that kind of discussion. Really fun episode. Taylor, [00:02:00] thanks for coming on. Appreciate it. Thanks again everybody, for all of the support. If you like what you hear, please go leave a five star review on iTunes, also on Spotify. Check us out over on Sportsman's Empire as well. Thanks again everybody.

See you next week, aunt Laura.

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We're live with a new episode of the Antler Up podcast, and I'm joined by PA Native. We got Taylor [00:05:00] Fleischer on the other side of the computer screen. Taylor man, pleasure to have you on, dude. Yeah, thanks for having me. Appreciate it. Oh, absolutely. We, we just, shot the shit for about 10 minutes prior to actually going live here right now.

And I'm excited for this conversation. I, it's been really cool to talk to certain guests from all over, whether it's Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Iowa, all various states. But I love being able to talk to Pennsylvanians, that kind of, Grew up hunting the same kind of heritage that I grew up in. Even more so to a more extent, someone that has a deep roots of the hunting.

Like my dad grew up chasing small game in, in whitetail and Turkey and all that stuff, but we didn't really trap, I'm not a I haven't gone have down that rabbit hole. I didn't really get into duck hunting. So just, I like talking to people that really this is their passion, their love and things that, they're their either dad, uncle, granddad, whoever passed it down to them.

So it's a pleasure to have you on, man.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. Yeah. I'm glad to be here. Like [00:06:00] I said, it I agree that Pennsylvania's, it's its own breeded cat when it comes to the outdoors. Yeah. It's got its own challenges

Jeremy Dinsmore: for sure. And also, you might be one of the first, if I'm hoping. I would like to say not, but I think that I know of that we can come on here and I could actually say we are and you'll be able to know what I'm talking about.

Taylor Fleischer: That's right. Penn State, for sure.

Jeremy Dinsmore: For sure, man. I know, dude. That's awesome. Now, what year did you graduate?

Taylor Fleischer: I graduated from Penn State in 2012.

Jeremy Dinsmore: 2012, okay. So that was just three years removed from me. So not too far along. So when I was graduating, you were coming in as that freshman, which we went to the, we were at the rose Bowl that year, I think, weren't we,

Taylor Fleischer: man?

I can't remember. I can't

Jeremy Dinsmore: remember. I think so. I think that's the year we went to the Rose Bowl, Darryl Clark and the guys and Derek Williams. They went out to the Rose Bowl that year and they got spanked. Yeah. Yeah. By usc. Yes. Oh man. But dude So we chit chatted through Instagram and [00:07:00] everything like that and talking prior to here, we were just saying about Penn State.

You, when we were talking about that, you said you hunted up this way. So you're a little bit familiar of some of the spots that I've, have tiptoed around, I guess you could say.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. When I was at Penn State obviously hunted close to campus. There, there were some game lands close to campus.

I hunted there and then actually over the mountain there at Whipple Dam. I spent a lot of time there in the woods. Actually did a lot of beaver trapping in the swamps there at Whipple Dam. So I'm sure, I don't know the woods like you do, but yeah, I've, if there's woods, if it's, if there's woods near me, I'm gonna try to stomp around and that's for sure.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yeah. Did you know that over by the football stadium, there's the archery only little spot there for whitetail? I did.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, so I actually hunted that spot for, maybe five or six hunts. When I was at Penn State, I totaled my truck. I hit a deer coming over the mountain, and they gave me a little Hyundai Elantra as a rental car.

I remember picking up that car and I'm used to a [00:08:00] truck and I've got my bow at school and I'm swapping vehicles out in the parking lot and I pull my bow outta my truck and put in the trunk of this car and the guy's yeah, that might be the first time a bow has been swapped vehicles in the parking lot.

So I took that little car into that spot and yeah, I hunted five or six times, saw some deer. I never shot anything there, but yeah I hunted that little archery only

Jeremy Dinsmore: spot. Yeah. What, let me know, did you have the same thought process that I did? I was like, man, please hope that a buck escaped from that little deer pen over there.

Yes.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, for sure. I was tempted to get my wire cutters out and make that happen. I

Jeremy Dinsmore: know. Oh my gosh. I, a couple seasons ago prior to it, oh my gosh. I. I actually had some cameras set out there just because you never know, right? Like for me, teaching that state college, it was an easy place for me to maneuver, drive, to walk into, just even to potentially fill a dough tag.

And I remember walking by the pen and just seeing all the deer and a couple, like [00:09:00] herds of bucks were just like, just walking around and dude, just Matt monsters just total monsters. I'm like, oh my gosh, that's just crazy to see that. And right here, in, in, in that fence. Yeah.

And, but yeah, one time I hunted that the first year that I, I did, I had a climber and I didn't know it was a Thursday, brought it after school, went up, climbed up the tree, and I found like a scrape and some rubs. And I was just like let's just get in here. This is all I have time for, right?

Because my teaching day was done at three 30, whatever. So I wanted to get up quick and as I'm climbing up, I'm not, I didn't see anything the whole night, but then all of a sudden I could hear a whole bun, bunch of ruckus happening from the one field by the road that I basically came in on, like people talking.

And next thing there's p all the ROTC kids coming through and they're coming through I guess they have a map, they have a, they have to go and hit checkpoints and everything. And I'm, they're [00:10:00] walking right below me, and here I am in a climber, so there's no sticks. There's no sign unless they look right up at me.

Finally one stopped that he was looking for whatever spot he needed to get to it. Taylor, I'm telling you he was, I could have spit on him. And then finally, and finally I just went I whistled to him and he looked up and I scared the live and piss out of him. And I was like, Hey, could I got a little bit of time like, if you're gonna push something, like try to circle or something.

He's what? I'm like, just circle around, see if some, a deer will kick over to me. He's oh, okay. And I kid you not, as soon as I climbed down, it was past dark. He must have kicked something cuz two came flying through. And with my headlamp, I could see, and I'm walking on the road and one of the lead instructors I guess was out there collecting, meeting with the kids.

I just said, he's Hey, how you doing buddy? Did you see anything? I said, I saw one of your buddies that I could have probably shot if I was an enemy. He started laughing and I said, no. I said, but he did a good job. I said, I told him to circle around to see if he could kick another deer to me.

And he, I said, he did, but it was too late. He goes, oh, nice. And [00:11:00] I said, do you come on Thursdays? He's yep. And I was like, All right. Yep. For the next couple years though, man, it never failed on good days that I could hunt after school. It was always on a Thursday to go there, and I was like, yep I'm, I know not to go there during that day.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. You never know what's gonna come through the woods around State College,

Jeremy Dinsmore: that's for sure. No, dude, you never know. Yeah, man. So you grew up hunting like you said, it seemed and really, here's a question to lead you off with, think back, Taylor to some hunting experiences that led you to become the hunter you are today.

Like the good, the bad, the ugly. Yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: So I grew up hunting rifle mainly when I started at 12 11 12. And a good friend of mine, his father was an archery hunter. I knew nothing about it. And I was at his house one day, we were riding four wheelers around and I came back and his dad is in a tree in the front yard with his bow, and he is shooting a target and.

That seems so odd to me because my father, he arch hunted as a kid, but he never really continued it through adulthood. So he was more he's got a family now [00:12:00] and a job and, there's other things that take your time. So that watching my buddy's dad shoot that bow out of the tree, it sparked it brought archery into the front of my mind.

And after, shortly after that, I talked with him and he got me into, he hooked me up with my first bow. It was an old Darden. And we shopped together some, he took me to his cabin, some I shot my first buck at, up at the cabin, at their family cabin. But so that buck, it's actually that buck right behind me is my very first buck.

Okay. But hunting that buck taught me a lot about what it takes to be an archery hunter, because that buck growing up a rifle hunter, you always think first light, that's when you get your best crack of a deer or right when it's getting dark. Those are your two best shots. Or at lunchtime when guys are walking around.

But that buck came in at 10 o'clock in the morning, which for me was foreign. You don't see deer at 10 o'clock in rifle season typically. And [00:13:00] that deer came in, he came in when I was thinking that there was nothing going on. I rushed the shot, I made a bad shot on him, hit him way back. But I hit him way back because I neglected to put my arm guard on and I hit my sleeve really hard and it went back in and it hit him right in front of the back leg and found him the next morning.

Not really any big deal because we found him, but Chris, the guy that got me into hunting, he pretty much sat me down as a 14 year old. I was 14 when I shot that deer and pretty much told me how important every aspect of archery hunting is. Making sure you don't forget to put that arm guard on, making sure that you're alerted all times because during the rut, as well as I do, you've got as good a chance at seven 30 as you do one 30.

Most days. But yeah, that shooting, that buck transformed my thought as to what it takes to be successful archery hunting[00:14:00] rifle hunting. I don't feel, and not to put down rifle hunting, but I don't feel that there's as much that you have to make sure is in line in order for you to be successful.

You got a pocket full of shells and a gun and. You get a shell in there, as long as your safety's off, you're good to go. But there's so many things that come into factor with a compound bow, especially that you just have to make sure everything's right. And angle of deer matters, whereas it doesn't, with a ri was much, everything matters.

So that, that hunt there changed my thought on, on ethical hunting.

Jeremy Dinsmore: And you could I would like for you to possibly even elaborate too on that specific hunt and on that specific deer, the whole bow hunting thing, because I have a similar feeling of when I shot my first dough. With the bow, like my first whitetail with a bow was a dough and that for me changed a lot for me as well.

Like I hit [00:15:00] the, hit that back artery on the back leg as well. And surprisingly the deer did not go very far. But I just the rush, the adrenaline, the process, like you were just saying the little things. And that's when my dad sat me down as well and was like, okay Jer, listen, you're going to have your moments and your bad moments and you probably are going to have more bad than good when it comes to archery hunting.

But, talk I guess about how that also made you love go down this rabbit hole of this strictly just pure passion that you have for bow hunting.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. So that whole challenge, that whole keeping everything in order. The other thing that I have a great passion for in the outdoors is trapping.

I love to trap coyotes, and it's very similar. It's a parallel that you can't screw anything up in order to be successful. You've gotta make sure everything is just right and if it's not right, you gotta figure out why it's not right and make sure it's [00:16:00] never not right again. So not saying that every mistake you learn from and you never do it again because I've made the ma same mistake many times.

Unfortunately, but, so yeah. The passion that I have for archery season comes strictly from trying to make sure that everything is not just right but perfect every time. It's not that I will ever achieve perfection with. With anything as far as archery goes, as far as anchoring, as far as not rushing, as far as making sure the animals got a perfect angle on it or whatever.

But the passion that I have for archery season is driven by wanting to achieve perfection. It will never happen, but I want to get as close to perfection as I can because if you can achieve perfection, it's not gonna be much fun anymore cuz there's nothing to learn anymore. I know I won't but the passion for me is trying to make everything as perfect as I can.

Yep. [00:17:00] Because there's nothing better than a perfect shot.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yep. Amen to that dude. And I could honestly sit here and say, I, and I'm hoping you're gonna say it, you, I bet you love the process as well.

Taylor Fleischer: Oh, almost more than the kill. Yeah.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yeah. That's how I am too. And are, I have plenty of friends, Mike, Jim, that are the same exact way that they love.

Shooting their bows and doing, like you said, just that little thing to, to make it better. You know how, and that's one aspect that I think, like I'm a, I love saddle hunting. That's the one, that's the aspect of the tool, the trade that I use. And early on when you, I was learning saddle hunting and how it could be a great tool in your toolbox.

It literally, once you get used to it and you feel really comfortable doing it, I'm like really, that's the only tool in the toolbox, right? But the one thing that I always tell people, and it's the one aspect that I actually have been writing a little bit [00:18:00] about that hopefully will be coming out soon, is to do that right now.

If you have. Like when I go shoot my bow at my in-laws house, they have a tree kind of at 40 yards where I normally just stand and shoot and take my shots or whatever. That is a perfect tree that I'll just put the platform on and I'll bring my saddle with me and I'll just hang from, and I'll put a target a little bit closer just so I'm not bombing 40 yards at for every single shot.

And I'll toss a couple little targets at different angles so then that way I could practice shooting that. And I love that little mini going through the process, like you said, Taylor, to be, try to strive for that perfection. We know we won't get there, but man, we will work hard to get that.

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Taylor Fleischer: last. And that's the, that's where the practice comes in the practice and the process. I shoot my bow every day, and most mornings I grab my cup of coffee, load my truck up to go to work, and I'll walk out back and I'll shoot two or three arrows.

I rarely leave that target on a bad arrow. If I shoot three and that third arrow is not right. I'm shooting three more. And some days it causes me to be a little later to the job site than I want to be, but I can't, my mind works in loops and I [00:20:00] can't allow an open loop to be there when I go to, to work if it doesn't feel good when I leave.

My day's screwed up. Yeah. So some days if I feel like I may not be on, I wait to shoot till after work because I know I'm gonna be putting 50 or 60 arrows down range. Not three or six.

Jeremy Dinsmore: So yeah we're in that same boat together now. So so when we look at this process and this was actually something that I had written down for us to talk about, but it comes up now, so let's discuss it.

When we look at. The whole process. And so tomorrow, so by the time, this will be a couple weeks after it, but we have an episode coming out with Aaron Heppler, a good friend of mine. And I want this to be a continuing phase until really the season goes around, just because I love to grow and maybe hopefully the listeners get something out of it, is how to become like a more efficient hunter.

So like we talked about the process of shooting our bows and that's, those are all great examples when it comes specifically to archery hunting. But what are some [00:21:00] other little details that you think, maybe that you used to overlook even, but have improved upon over the last couple years?

Taylor Fleischer: That's a good question. I try to improve upon everything. The one thing and this isn't necessarily doesn't necessarily apply to everyone cuz I know not everybody uses trail cameras, but the one thing that I have tried to be better at, my guess it all comes into efficiency, is. To not let trail camera data go wasted.

So when I pull cards or when I get a ping on my phone, I don't want to just, scan through dodo do, I don't want to do that. So the last the last three years when I check camera cards, I grab a notepad and I write down, I know how each camera is oriented, so I write down what direction they're coming from.

I have a tally sheet. I'll say, two food or two bedding and AM or pm and I'll, and my [00:22:00] break off is, so I have am midday and pm so up to nine o'clock I call AM nine to three, I call midday, and then three on is pm. So I take tallies as to when they're going to bed. Or when they're going to food, or not necessarily tubed, but that direction or the direction of food.

And that data, even on dough, button, buck, I don't care. I just wanna know patterns. So in the past, I was one of those guys that hit the arrow. I see a dough, pitcher arrow, arrow. Just keep on going till I find a buck. And sometimes you never found a book, but all those dough pitchers that I neglected to study, so to speak is wasted data.

It's like very valuable data. And the other thing I do in the fall when I'm analyzing that data is I'll pull up weather underground has historical weather data. Yep. So I'll pull that up on a screen beside my computer and [00:23:00] I'll look at that day and I'll think, okay, we got a lot of movement that day.

Why did that happen? Or why did all the movement happen in the morning that day? So you look at, was the. I don't put a lot of stock into any one variable, but big swings in temperature, obviously. Pressure I look at, although I feel like pressure's a lot more hit and miss than big temperature swings.

Yeah. And moon phase, I gotta say, I don't put a ton of stock in moon phase at all. I don't even really mark that down. I don't think it's super relevant. I know some guys swear by a full moon or a new moon, but I don't. So all that data plays into it. So if I have one day that has a ton of tallies at an am going to, going to food, I want to know why.

So I think that's the biggest mistake too that people make is when they scout for deer sign. They don't scout the habitat. They're looking for rubs, they're looking for scrapes, they're looking for beds. But they don't really ask why is he rubbing [00:24:00] there or why is he vetted there?

So I think that is something also that I've tried to focus more on, instead of just marking a pin on Spartan Forage that there's a rub here. I like to stand by that rub and see if I can see the next rub, cuz there's usually another one close. And then you connect the dots and then you figure out why he's walking that path as opposed to the one on the next bench.

So habitat's huge.

Jeremy Dinsmore: So did you, have you done anything in recently that has helped you with the habitat aspect of things? Because that's an an attribute that I'm trying to get better at myself. What you like, I love. One thing when I was coaching, I, especially when we got down in, we did it early season, we did it when we were winning.

We did it, especially when we were losing is, I always used to say, what is your why? And that is, I've learned to become, like you said, doing the tally marks, like tho that is great information of the way you break it down, going in a little bit more depth. And [00:25:00] being that I finally have, I've been able to have a deer the last couple years continuously show up the last two, three years, and he's obviously been bigger each year.

I'm going that little extra mile and I'm trying to ask that question, the why this route? Why does he con. If I leave this camera here to last three years, he hits it X amount of times, but he's hitting it around that same time and same thing around the other cameras. And so the one aspect though, that I need to get better at is the whole habitat side of things.

Cuz obviously hunting the big woods, the big mountains, they're, especially back in home, there's not a whole thing, a whole lot of food screaming at you when you look at your feet. There's acorns everywhere, right? There's brows everywhere. There's not a particular food plot. Hey, there's a food plot.

There might be, but it's across the highway and I'm doubt that buck's gonna be doing that unless X, Y, and Z. So that is in an area that I'm trying to learn and get better at. As far [00:26:00] as the habitat goes. Did you do anything as to help you with your learning curve? Is it something for school?

Like what, how, or what is making you get a little bit better with that?

Taylor Fleischer: I went to school for horticulture and turf science. So those are my degrees. So I have, I wouldn't say a leg up, but I'm more familiar with certain plants than someone who doesn't have that background. So I think it's really important, a if you're trying to figure out what's going on as far as brows and food, know the difference between a white oak and a red oak, know if they're feeding on spice bush, if they're feeding on, if you've got, some dogwood around it's really important to identify what they're eating.

And then be able to, if you stumble across a patch of something that they like there, you might say, Hey, they're not hitting it now, but when that other patch is dried up, they may be working this way. I think the biggest thing you could do is know exactly what the plants are that are in your [00:27:00] woods, and whether or not it's beneficial to a deer, no sense.

Trying to hang a stand in a maple woods. There's no reason for a deer to be in there. If you're in a, if you're in a patch of sugar maples, it's nothing more than a pass-through. They're not gonna be hanging around, long. It's just an opening. That doesn't mean they won't cruise it for doze, but they're not gonna be trying to get a bite to eat there.

So I don't have a great answer as to anything I've done specifically for habitat but knowing the trees and shrubs is huge.

Jeremy Dinsmore: I think, I guess too, another aspect of that is, is getting more opportunities, boots on the ground. Get more opportunities where you could learn and see. And that's the one aspect, I forget who I had on, and they were talking about, just noticing the pick up more of the little things like what deer are browsing on instead of, like you just said, finding the rubs and the scrapes and the beds.

Look at what are deer actually consuming? So then you could mark that as it fresh, is it not fresh? And go from there. So I think just getting out there, getting more [00:28:00] experience doing that w is also a big factor.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. And I think the one browse too, that I know that the dairy at my place that most people overlook is the multi-floor rows.

They eat the crap out of it. And if there's a pocket of it, they'll work those edges and new eat the new chutes off that multi-floor rose all afternoon crazy. And no, that's not there in the fall. But it's a good thing to know that, hey, they may swing if times get tough and the food is scarce, they may swing back by that patch in the fall.

Yeah. Yeah, it's. And the other thing is setting up cameras in areas where you think they're gonna browse because you can confirm what they're browsing on. Go to a thick spot where it looks like the deer hanging out and hang a camera and see if they're just hanging out or if they're actually there to browse.

Jeremy Dinsmore: So here's, how long have you been doing the whole historical data stuff with the trail cameras that, with the tally marks, do you think? Three years. Okay. So three years. Did you, have you noticed [00:29:00] anything regarding like a more mature buck versus younger buck patterns? Because that's something that I would wanna know.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. So obviously Buck are a lot like us in the sense they have their own, they got their own personality. But the one thing that I noticed I don't, I guess it's not a hard and fast rule but I do notice that when Buck get to a certain age, the buck that I killed this past year I had more daytime pictures of him than any other buck in the fall. And I had maybe 40 cameras out in the fall. And I probably had I would say 20 to 30 daytime pictures of him between October 20th and November 10th the day I killed him. And so I think, and I've heard other people say this, and I didn't really come to this conclusion by myself, but it's been confirmed that as Buck get older, it's almost like [00:30:00] they, for lack of a better term, they get a little C now.

Yeah. Like they get to a point where they're not as sharp as they used to be. Because a three and a half year old they're pretty dead set on breeding really hard. And I think. I've heard it before, that a two and a half and a three year, three and a half year old is like peak breeding life for a buck.

And as they get older it's less important to, obviously it's still important, but it's less important as it would be for a three and a half year old. So I think as they get older, they become more vulnerable in the sense that they're not quite as, as sharp as they once were. I don't know, I don't know the dog years ratio for deer.

I don't know what a five year old buck is in human years but I do think that, the five and a five year old buck's tough to kill. But there's something about it that, that like a, I don't know, they're just, they're more visible. That doesn't mean they're easier to kill, but they're more

Jeremy Dinsmore: visible.

Yeah. They slip up a little bit. More so than they [00:31:00] would've when they were younger. And I've heard that too. And I, what's funny is that you say that because I remember when I first heard that thinking about the buck that I mentioned earlier, is that maybe this is the year like maybe this is the year I'll finally pick that right spot and time it right.

But no man that's good. Let's transition a little bit. You did a recent podcast with the guys over at PA Backcountry podcast. So I don't want to dive, deep into that whole story cuz you, you already did that basically. But, to give a quick background on this, Taylor you entered the bow hunting league.

You had the top buck for pa you killed that Bucky scored, I think 1 52 in some change.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, 1 52 in change. Bo and Young.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yep. All right, so now we're we're just talking about like the experience of your first archery buck and some things that we could improve upon being efficient. So anything unique.

About that particular hunting experience that you had on this buck obviously resulted in, in a record buck that, that you would be able to apply for future hunts. So [00:32:00] like, all those opportunities, things you learned from that buck, like what are you taking from that's gonna help you now even jump up that next rung if you were to say

Taylor Fleischer: so with that book he was virtually invisible the first two years that I hunted him.

And then this third year is the year I killed him. He became more visible. And I don't know if it's because I had a whole lot more effort put towards him, specifically if, I was hanging cameras specifically for him, not just for general activity. I knew where he was sleeping, but I didn't know exactly how he was getting there.

So I. The one thing I took away from this buck that I will apply this upcoming year on whatever buck turns out to be my target buck. But I'm gonna focus cameras more specifically on one deer. So instead of hanging a camera in a general opening or scouting for just general sign or general habitat, I want to find his sign.

I want to find[00:33:00] exactly what he is doing, not what all the bucks are doing. I, quite frankly, I could care less what a fork is doing at this point in his life. If he turns into something, then I'll care. But yeah. So I think the thing that has made me what I will apply to next year is singularly focusing on one beer.

Yeah. Now that can get tiring and it can get exhausting. It can get very frustrating. But that's what it takes. You rarely just dumb into him. You've gotta have a ton of intel that supports why you're hunting that, staying that day.

Jeremy Dinsmore: It allows you to confirm things too. Maybe that things that you've been out scouting it allows, it confirms one that two, that he's obviously alive, but you maybe are able to game plan for like how you said, like all bucks had different personalities, and you could garner that. And you know what for, let's talk about this, but, to build upon that and bring what we already were discussing. When you think about those previous seasons when you got him on camera [00:34:00] and you said those first two years he was non-existent.

And this past year he was that what were things that you were. What puzzle were you putting together? From like the scouting, the deer behavior, the pressure, like what were some of the things that you were able to clump into this puzzle and this equation, basically, and be able to finally solve it, if that makes sense?

Yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: I knew of two of his beds. I knew his pri what I called his primary bed and his secondary bed. Whether it was in, in that order, I don't know. I knew there was another bed that he had that was not on me that was on another property that I would've never found because I would never go over there.

But I knew where he was sleeping. I knew mainly what he was eating. I mean his, where he felt comfortable eating. Obviously when the rut, comes in, that's all thrown out. That's early season stuff. But. So I guess the biggest piece of the puzzle that I found that kind of helped to seal the deal on him, so to [00:35:00] speak, was I found a path that, that he ran, that paralleled a pretty heavy dough path.

And it was, they never skyline these books. They never walked the top of a ridge or a spoil pile. They're always, down 15 yards, down 20 yards, wherever it's comfortable. And I found a path that was very faint, and I hung a camera on that path thinking that it was a buck trail, not knowing it was his.

But it turns out that it was his, and he pretty much used it every other day and finding that trail. Allowed me to make a connection between his one bed, his backside in exit of that bed down through a lot of thick stuff and kind of poked up without going through his feeding area, he was in nothing but thick stuff until he got up to another section that he frequented. So it was almost like that was his his main path when there was no pressure was [00:36:00] through a pretty open shoot up into this into his feeding area. And when there was pressure, when guys were hammering on tree stands and running four-wheelers, it seemed like he frequented that secondary path, so to speak, a whole lot more.

And I had never seen a deer walk back there. There was no reason for deer to be back there. It's not like it was any great path, but he went out of his way. To walk that difficult path, so to speak, and me finding that out was very beneficial to to killing him. Spartan

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You have dear prediction, journaling and the best maps on any hunting app platform There is Use code antler up to save 20% off your Smart and Forge membership@spartanforge.ai. So now you've [00:37:00] pulled all those pieces of that puzzle together. What what entry, exit route considerations like your wind, what all, what were some of those key factors that you really had to either be careful, not be careful for?

Did you have a, this is the only type of wind just because for me, Certain areas, and I know for a certain time I've heard Steve Sherk talk about it too. Sometimes when you're up in the big woods in the mounds, it's, you just gotta go because it's gonna stay one way. When you get in there, it might be doing that for five minutes and then it switches and it's gonna come back.

So did you have any sort of game plan when it came to that?

Taylor Fleischer: So yeah, the I'm with Steve on that. Yeah. It's kinda a crap shit sometimes, but yeah. So the thing with my property is it's, there's sections of my property that are super steep steep to the point you can't walk it.

And those thermals come up over, if you're standing on the top, you can feel that wind just rushing up over there. You watch a crow fly [00:38:00] out over that top and you can see the wind just shove him straight up and. And those thermals are extremely difficult if you're anywhere between, the top and the bottom.

Which thermals I have not figured out thermals yet. I feel like, I'll be checking wind in a stand and everything's perfect, and I'll look down at my watch and look back up and everything has switched in 30 seconds and I don't know, I wish I could figure out how to fix that because it would make hunting so much easier.

But but no, as far as the wind goes, we have pretty steady steady wind that comes one specific direction. It swirls around the end of the hill. It's not really a straight line, but it's a swirl that is pretty constant. It shifts every once in a while, but those thermals are really tough.

And it's, like I said, it's really steep and you really can't predict how that works. I know you got morning and evening and that, that makes a big [00:39:00] difference. But they're tough to hunt for me, so I do my best at predicting how those thermals are gonna be when I go into a stand.

That being said, if I'm at camp for three days, I'm not gonna not hunt one day because the thermals aren't quite right. So yeah I'm go for it and hope for the best, but I do take it into consideration, but it's not it's not a determining factor as to whether or not I'm gonna hunt a specific stand maybe, but not hunting in general.

Yeah. What

Jeremy Dinsmore: about for your entry exit route situation? Did you have a game plan regarding that?

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah so on the very, so I, once again, it's steep, so I don't wanna skyline myself either. So I try. I walk out of the way but I always walk down into a hollow that I know he doesn't go into or any deer really go into.

So I go into this deep hollow and then walk it the whole way to the bottom where I like to hunt and then I poke up out. So I feel like my scent is protected in that hollow a good bit. It's staying in that hollow and a deer's not gonna cross that hollow [00:40:00] typically, so they're not gonna pick me up down there or my boot tracks.

So my entry is in a real steep ravine and then I pop up the side and I'm, a hundred yards from my stand that I like to hunt. Gotcha.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Nice. So now we're talking about hunting, how you were saying about trying to find that one specific buck when it comes to your trail cam strategy and everything, you don't really care about the, those forks.

So that forker that you didn't care about three years ago, is there a new one that leading into, to next year that you're gonna be hoping the to get after?

Taylor Fleischer: For me this upcoming year? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know about a forker, but there's a couple there that I'm interested in to see what they're gonna be.

Yeah. The one somebody shot one hit him in the neck and it grazed his neck, so he's got a real big slice on his neck. It happened first week in November. But he's a good buck and I wish somebody wouldn't have attempted that shot on him because it had to have been a straight on shot. Yeah. But he's fine.

I think I have pictures of him [00:41:00] recently, so I'd like to get that that guy, because he's got a very unique scar. That's gonna be a great indicator with the trail camera pitchers here this

Jeremy Dinsmore: spring. Yeah. Hopefully he got even bigger now, so that'll be good. Nice. So talking about your ma your property.

What are some of the steps you've taken to manage it and like what challenges, that you see that you really have to overcome with that? Because it's a such a cool thing. I think all hunters will sit there and say, man, I would love to have something right. That you can manage. And then when you get it there's obviously challenges that are, that come with that.

What have you done so far that you would like to do and I guess some of the challenges with that?

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. As far as challenges the biggest thing is not being there all the time. Couple years ago, 2014, the Emerald Dashboard came through and we lost a lot of our mature trees. Actually we did a survey and kind of saw that the dashboard was there, so we elected to [00:42:00] log and take those trees off while there was still some value and they didn't.

Pose a hazard down the road because my neighbor did not, and he's always clearing trees off his lane. And and he's got some around his tree stands that he's very concerned about. So that aspect of timber management, has it been big? When we first bought the property, it was covered with Atlantis trees.

We have killed probably, oh I wouldn't even be able to put a number on it, but hundreds of Atlantis trees either hacked in squirt or cut down and treated the stump. They're awful for. When we lost the ash, there was a lot of open canopy space and those things just shot up and we did not want them because there's virtually no value and they're extremely invasive.

So the timber management aspect of it has pretty much just been managing the lantis. And weathering the storm, so to speak, of losing 50% of our mature trees. Okay. So that's been tough. But [00:43:00] as far as other practices we don't do any burning or anything. I don't feel like we the terrain is too tough to try to control a burn there, so it's not flat ground.

It's not a lot of dead stuff that needs to be burned off. I wish I could, but I'm just, I'm not ballsy enough to light a fire up there because I can't, I don't know that I could get to the far side quick enough if it would get outta control. Yeah. But we have some food plots. I have three less than a half acre.

Each plots that I rotate, there's one is always clover, one is typically oats or something for the turkeys, some type of sorghum, some type of grass. And then the other one is just a revolving door of perennial mixes. I'm trying a few different things this year, but I enjoy experimenting with that.

I don't have any hard belief that one specific crop is the best. Nice. Yeah. But but yeah it's good to have options. So it's nice to see that. But yeah, other than that, other than the food plots and a little bit [00:44:00] of timber management we let it do its thing. We plant a bunch of trees and shrubs every year to try to get 'em established.

That's a tough thing to do in the woods, but. We kind of figure, if 50% of them make it, that's more than we had before.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yeah. Good deer

Taylor Fleischer: numbers. Yeah, pretty good. I would say it's it's not as good as it once was. There's a lot more adobe and killed on bordering properties than there used to be.

But we don't kill any doe on our property simply because the neighbors kill them a lot. So we don't feel we need to. But yeah, I mean there's a lot of pressure there too though, especially in rifle season on neighboring properties. Not from us. We rarely hunted in rifle. We like to be done by rifle season.

Yeah. But Yeah, I would say the deer numbers are good. Not great. Okay.

Jeremy Dinsmore: So what, so when you look at your your game planning for next year, what does that look like for you? Do you put all your eggs in that [00:45:00] basket of your, the property you manage? Do you still go around where you live currently and scout and have backup plans basically, or even heck you might find a great buck that you're like, that's the buck I'm after.

Yeah. What does that look like? Because I'm, I don't wanna say I'm in that same boat, but I do, I'll travel back at home where I do have that private opportunity, but then I also have more of that public land here in central pa that I do also hunt a good bit I plan to hunt a good bit, come next year.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, so we have we have our 30 acres there in Mifflin County and then back here in Cumberland County. I have a couple small spots that I have the ability to hunt less than 10 acre parcels. It's very grown up around here, so it's pretty much archery only, which is cool with me. But so every once in a while a buck will come through Cumberland County.

That really piques my interest. There was a nice one killed on an adjacent property a couple years ago that was in the one forties. Nice. That was a great buck. And I was I was, when you've got a great buck at [00:46:00] camp, but there's one, 15 minutes from home, it's a tough decision, it's really it's a good problem to have.

I'll say that but it's like sitting in the tree stand that that you didn't want to go into and you watch it go under the other one. Yeah. So my plan every year is I scout Mifflin County very hard. I feel like I know Mifflin County a whole lot better now than I did eight years ago, but Cumberland County is a little bit different because nothing is staying on those parcels that I hunt.

It's passed through deer. I don't really know what I'm gonna get a chance to kill until, October. It's it's nothing. I'm not watching one buck all year in Cumberland County. So my scouting in Cumberland is limited because I would, I don't wanna say it's pointless, but it's, I.

It's not as important as deer that I know are gonna be there at the cabin. So yeah I scout both, but definitely heavier in Mifflin County. I don't hunt a lot of public land. I would love [00:47:00] to. I just don't. It's, I have nothing against it. I think it's super admirable. These guys that can go 6, 8, 10 miles back in and plug a, plug it towed. I think that's awesome. But I don't, but I will someday, I guarantee that. Yeah.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Yeah. We sit here now, right? Like we're bef the summer hasn't even began yet. And we're as positive, we're as optimistic as we are as possible. When the season doesn't go as we hope or as planned, do you have a process or something that makes you get redialed in and like the whole pivoting, that, like again, that's where I struggled with last year is trying to pivot and capitalize on that. Any experiences with that? Something, cuz again, you are go, you're traveling, like you're, it's not just a hop skip and a jump for you.

It's, you gotta travel a little bit of distance. Do you just go and try to figure it out there? Or do you stay at home like you said, because there are still some [00:48:00] good deer that you just, you never know and then when shit doesn't go good there, you're like, damnit, I should have just gone to Mifflin County.

I'm sure that's you've said that.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Many times. But no, I don't think I've ever had a season not go to plan. Yeah. But no. As far as that pivot I make myself, my father and I loved archery hunt. Now, like I said, he didn't archery hunt when I first started getting into it, but he's got this new rekindled, flaming archery, our treatment right.

He's, he and I, that's my guy when it comes to archery hunting. So we set aside two weeks every year that we're going to camp. No matter what's, no matter what's in Cumberland County, we're going there. We're, that's just our trip. So that varies every year when that is. But as far as, I draw up a plan in my mind every year, the week before archery season starts as to how I'm gonna, what weekends I'm gonna try to get [00:49:00] to camp what days through the week I'm gonna try to hunt after work.

Can I knock off on a Friday early and hunt Friday evening and then Saturday morning. I like to do that. Obviously the weather screws everything up there all the time. Yeah. But so I always have a plan, but as far as pivoting from Cumberland County to Mifflin County, If I know I have a good buck in Cumberland County that I'm after I give my early season to it.

Okay. So I try to give October up to Halloween or whenever we're gonna go up, up to the cabin. That's, I usually give it, the good college try in the early season on that buck. If it doesn't even feel remotely possible that buck is gonna give me a chance I may, bail on it earlier because there's something special about killing a buck at camp.

It's just, I don't know, it's just a different feel. You know what's gonna hang on the wall at camp and you're there, you're eating chili at lunchtime and, it's [00:50:00] just a whole different feeling crawling out of, dusty jeans and throwing on your camo and heading into a tree, stand after work.

It's not quite the same feel, it just, You don't get that satisfaction. But that being said, I like to kill my do in Cumberland County because they've got a serious problem there, and so we try to do our meat hunting, so to speak there. But yeah, I would say as far as my pivot, I'm going to camp no matter what at the, the best time I'm going in, the first week in November second week in November, that timeframe I'm going because there's always at least, buck that we would be willing to take there.

Okay. May not be, a pope and young buck, but there's always good buck there. So yeah, I don't really have a, I don't think I've ever decided I'm staying home during the rut. Yeah. I don't think I've ever, there's too much competition down here that I could be hunting a buck that got killed October 2nd, dude,

Jeremy Dinsmore: I [00:51:00] love everything you just said because, That is me to the T. Like I, because my thought process going into next year was stay here where I live in central pa, hunt this all the way up till the end of October. Like I get, I was going to give myself this, I was gonna keep tabs. Like my dad will probably go out here and there.

But even then he's still that old school mentality. Like I can't go in those good spots until it's good. Which is great for me. And same thing, like for with my dad, he's been, I, he's got the archery bug again. We've, he's, we're always like, he is on, he has, he just took my younger sister who graduated from Penn State, from nursing with a four, oh, I don't know where she, a hell of a lot smarter than I am.

They went on a a, a. Whole resort stay for her. But anyway, long story short, he's sent, he's sending me some trail cam photos from the resort. He's [00:52:00] Hey look at, we got this buck going on and everything, but again, my game plan for next year is going to be hunt here, central pa all October basically until that end of October.

I would like to maybe get to Ohio, those last two kind of weekends as well. And then November, I plan on hitting back at home hard because dude, even though I had those great pictures from the Good Bucks back, like I said to you this past year, it really wasn't, en encounters didn't really happen until that early November, end of October, anyway, like my Halloween weekend when Penn State played Ohio State.

That was the day of the most rud action I had all last year actually. So yeah, I'm looking at it as, you know what. I know I've hunted that my whole life. I know when the time is great. You know what I mean? I just know it, I just need to be patient. And that's where I wasn't patient.

I was trying to be too aggressive last year [00:53:00] of oh, I'm getting this camera. He's only five minutes. He's still five minutes till dark. I just need to be in there and cut 'em off and come up with that game plan. And probably, dude, I was probably blowing 'em out. Yeah. So my thing is that, so to hear someone else almost in the same story as me, it, it's refreshing cause I'm like, all right, like this is someone I could, we could bounce a lot of ideas off of.

Cuz man, I struggle like it's a two, two hour or two an hour and a half, and it's not just, again, I'm, I have to like, could I get outta work early on a Friday that I could hunt the evening and be able to. Hunt all day Saturday or figure it out basically. That was really, to me, I took a lot out of that.

So I appreciate that. And the whole pivoting thing, that's where I always would struggle because again, I'm like, man, I got nothing here. Do I travel two and a half hours? You know what I mean? So that's where now I plan to do, which I've done this past, post-season is scout a lot more here, figure out.

And if I run into hunters, like I [00:54:00] run into hunters, I'm not, it's not right To me, I'm like okay, cuz it's not my good spots back at home basically.

Taylor Fleischer: And it's you that it's such a good problem to have is to have multiple options. I know guys that have, one tree stand location but would kill to have, half a dozen spots they could go.

I feel bad even saying, I don't wanna stay here, go somewhere else. But yeah, it's. I don't have a great answer. And just because that, that you agree with me, that doesn't mean we're

Jeremy Dinsmore: righteous as far as oh, I know. Oh, I know.

Taylor Fleischer: So I could be way off too. I mean it all.

It all, the weather affects my plan every year. And the bucks that are on camera at both locations affect my plan every year. I don't know. I'm a firm believer of the hunt is more than the deer, and I just, I can't get enough time in the woods whether there's no chance of me killing a great buck or not.

I'd sit in a cul-de-sac if I wouldn't get in trouble. I just, there's just something about being out there that I can't do it enough.

Jeremy Dinsmore: That's how I said [00:55:00] it on a podcast with Dan Johnson at during hunting season, or actually when we just wrapped up and he asked me how the season went.

I was like, could a se a season be successful even though you didn't fill your buck tag? And I said, because that's how I feel like I felt last year was a very successful year for me. So I'm hoping to. Build upon that. And I've had a great spring already. I killed the tur two turkeys and one here in pa, one in Ohio.

So I'm like, let's keep this shit rolling. So here's a question for you. When, cuz building upon the whole, we have our own private land, I guess that, that you'd say that we hunt and we scout it. And even though we've been there for many years, I think maybe a listener that doesn't have that opportunity to have a 30 acre or whatever piece, because I guess I would say the private area that I hunt the mountain it's 2000 acres.

However, like you're obviously it being a club, you have your own little section, I guess you could say. So it's a small chunk of that 2000. [00:56:00] Now on our side of the mountain, there's not a whole lot of people nearby until rifle season. There's two or three older guys, but again, they like, they'll hunt till 10 o'clock, go back and that's it.

What is your scouting philosophy? I guess like for end of the season, up until the season, because they'll go and I'll scout new areas or I'll why was the deer moving there? Do you go through that process as well? Basically going back to what we said earlier, figuring out the why. Yeah.

Yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: And something we also said earlier is the buck have different personalities. So the buck that I was after last year which I got, he's now, he's out of the equation. So I don't think that one of these other buck is gonna go lay in his old bed. I don't think it's gonna work that way.

They may like the same features, they find comfort in the same thickets or the same travel corridors, but it may not change drastically every year. Where deer like to bed every year but, If you're gonna [00:57:00] focus on one specific deer, like I feel like I have transitioned to that more so than I have in the past.

You need to know the small changes. So there may, a tree may have fallen across an old logging road and they're no longer gonna try to walk through that tree. So you gotta figure out, alright, so they're not gonna walk through this path anymore. So where are they gonna go now? How are they gonna get around this tree?

Or are they gonna dip the whole way down to the next trail? Or are they just gonna try to, just go around the root ball of this tree? Something as small as a tree falling over or the other thing that happens up at our camps sometimes is these, we get these microbursts because we're on the end of a ridge.

And not too long ago, a couple years ago, we had a, I wouldn't say it was a tornado that touched down, but there was a bunch of trees. Big mature trees and they just got spun off and they just made a brush pal that was 75 yards wide. [00:58:00] And that changed everything. That not only created, like right now it's a huge open canopy and it's getting really thick and it's becoming a new bedding area that wasn't there five years ago.

It was open woods and it was, and now it's it's so thick you don't want to even try to get through it. We've been trying to establish a few trees along the edges of it just to not allow it to become nothing but rosebush. But so events like that change your scouting because it changes your bedding.

And also the pressure, so what your neighbors doing in regards to how they're hunting their land. They might put a new standup on closer to your line or closer to a bedding area that these deer used to like if they get, Too aggressive or get too close, that's gonna change.

It's so scouting private land, as much as you wanna say it's like starting fresh every year. It's not, it's more of confirmation, scouting. You need to go and make sure that the bucker still betting where you think they're bedden, [00:59:00] the, those are eating what you think they're eating.

And yeah you're confirming old thoughts and if something new pops up like a tree or like a mature buck being taken out of that something's gonna change. And your job in scouting is figuring out what's gonna change and why is it gonna change. So the whole why thing, why they're doing this now.

Y sometimes you never figure that out, but that's the whole goal of scouting, right? That's, yeah. I. Yeah, there's no book on it, but there's, it's a method to the madness, so to speak. Yeah.

Jeremy Dinsmore: And like we've heard on countless of episodes, either on our epi, on our podcast, on other podcasts, on articles and books, you've, I've, you've always heard that when one big buck dies, another one's going to come in and take its place.

So that's an exciting thing for you because you seems like you got the big guy on campus, and now the next one in line, hopefully, and now you have to try to figure that one out.

Taylor Fleischer: I don't even know what [01:00:00] Buck I'm trying to figure out at this point. That's, and that's what's fun.

It's, yeah, I don't know. We're gonna find out, hopefully, once they, they're pushing brows already, so we're gonna find out sooner than you think, but, Yeah. So like for

Jeremy Dinsmore: me, I, we normally on our side of the mountain don't get a lot of buck pictures right now. We, they'll pop in that little bit of late August, then they'll go, we'll get a little bit here and there, and then August rolls around.

They'll start sporadically younger ones. And then that end like when that dreary date timeframe I don't know if you've ever heard that about that. It's like the 19th through the 23rd or whatever. Yeah. What we, I've noticed that's been a almost like a confirmation for me that I've noticed the last two, three years.

And then they go missing again for a little bit until that next shift happens and then boom, there they are. So like for you, like you said, you don't know what buck you really want to go after yet this for this upcoming season. Will you get a them on camera now and figure out, oh wow. He looks like a [01:01:00] good one.

He's probably gonna be staying put.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. So they do, they stay on my property all season. Yeah. Won the rut. So last year the buck I killed last year took off for about three weeks. He was gone. And it was probably the second week of October to, almost November he was gone.

He wasn't there. It was funny though, after I killed him, I was sent some trail cam pictures from another guy down the valley, and I don't know this guy, but he, he just reached out to me. I guess he found out that I killed this deer, and he sent me some pictures of this buck at his place in that timeframe when he was gone.

And he's, almost two miles away from where I'm at. So he took off. I'm sure he was, I don't know if somebody spooked him or if he was just following Adele, but he decided that he was gonna go explore something else. But yeah. The Buckeye killed last year. I had pictures of him in Velvet.

I had pictures of him [01:02:00] in June, July, August. He was, I knew he was there all year. So I think I'm hoping that whatever Buckeye decide to go after this year should present himself here, once they get done, pushing Antler. But yeah I don't know. I have pictures of that buck that I mentioned has a scar on his neck.

I have pictures of him two weeks ago, and he's starting to push still don't know what he's gonna be. Yeah. But I'm very curious if that injury is gonna affect his antler growth. If it's gonna make

Jeremy Dinsmore: him funky. Yeah. Yeah. You have to let me know. Keep me posted on that one. Yeah. All right, man let's we'll transi transition to the kind of the wrapping things up and what's gimme me, gimme a hot take.

Gimme something that That you've been noticing recently in the hunting world on media and all that stuff that you're just like, oh my gosh you shake your head a little bit about Yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: Oh man there's plenty to shake your head about. I I'm puzzled by things people say and do all the time.

I was [01:03:00] thinking about something today though, while I was working. I was listening to some other guys talk and something that I was thinking about. I don't know if it's so much a hot take, just an opinion on on something that the game commission is doing that I, I would like to see it changed a little bit.

It's not really a not really bitching, I'm just giving my opinion, but the pa elk thing, there's a lot of non-residents that draw tags for pa Elk and I would really like to see I would really to see maybe an allotment for non-residents, but man, when you look at that draw list, there is people from, it's not like it's 50 50 but there's a lot of non-residents that get to shoot our elk, so to speak.

The reason that we're on such A C W D quarantine is because of those elk. They're scared to death that's gonna get into that elk herd. And for good reason, they're a herd animal. The c w D gets into the elk. That's bad news for them. But but yeah I don't know. I feel like you gotta treat your home homegrown boys a little better in that regard as far as who

Jeremy Dinsmore: gets to draw.

Yeah. [01:04:00] I'm with you on that one. I just, I all, my, my buddy Mike that lives in New York, he's I'm putting in for him. Yeah, because if you get it, I'm coming with you and I might knock you out and shoot it while you're on the ground and say you did. Yeah. Oh yeah. I know, man. Dude, I.

I don't know how many points I have. I'm up there, but I just, it's almost, thank goodness it's 30 bucks, right? It's only what 30 ends up being 33 or 40 bucks, whatever now. But yeah. Ah, man, I just, one day I would love to get Yeah, get that tag. A gentleman that my wife grew up with, I think they're around the same age, went to high school and everything.

He didn't pull a tag, but a friend did and he was with them and he said it was pretty awesome. Pretty cool stuff. Yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, I know a couple guys that have killed cows. I don't know of anybody that's killed a bull, but yeah it's I'm, I've hunted up there, I've hunted in Clinton County in Clearfield County, and it is, that is something else to just see an [01:05:00] elk come through the woods.

It's, it sounds like a mack truck come through the woods compared to a deer. It's, I know, it's wild.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Even just seeing the, even seeing the rubs, you're

Taylor Fleischer: like, oh, I know. Yeah, I know. And yeah, you, it looks like a skid loader was trying to shove the tree over, it's wild. But yeah, that's not much of a hot take.

It's just something I was thinking about today actually that yeah I don't know. I wish that would be changed a little bit, but overall I have. Very minimal complaints about the game commission. Yeah. They're doing what they can to try to draw people in and you can't fault 'em for that.

It's all money, but you can't fault 'em for trying. I'm, Hey, whatever they decide to pass, I'm cool with. I'm gonna hunt no matter what on the days that I want.

Jeremy Dinsmore: Exactly. Yeah. How are you how would Sunday hunting affect you?

Taylor Fleischer: I don't know. Sunday hunting, not having Sunday hunting right now is a forced rest day for me.

So I like having Sundays off. I'm not against it by any stretch of the imagination. If they wanna open up Sundays, [01:06:00] I'm cool with that. I, it'd be great to be able to go to camp and hunt more than one day before you gotta go back to work, but Yeah I'm pretty indifferent on it.

Yeah. As far as it affecting me, I'd probably just be a little more tired come mid-November, because I'd probably hunt a few more days. But I, I don't, Hey, whatever. Like I said, I'm pretty easygoing on that stuff, the opener of rifle being pushed around that is heavily contested and I don't give a flying fart about it, honestly.

I'm with you. I, you know what? Yeah. I think if they think it's gonna generate more hunters and money, I think they're, I think they're a little bit mistaken because I think the guys that wanna hunt are gonna hunt. Exactly. I don't think the day of the week changes who's hunting. Yeah.

Jeremy Dinsmore: I think on the rifle, hot takes things.

For me it would screw me, I think, big time, because what I've noticed in it, it's not just where I teach, I think it's just in the teaching world. I just, honestly, I think it's the working world. When something goes away, I. It's usually not coming back. It's usually a tougher time. So [01:07:00] what ended up happening was once they removed the Monday opener, they removed for our district the Monday, Tuesday, they have school now.

Yeah. So for me, I'm, that Saturday, Sunday is huge for me. So I'm that, yeah, because I'm, I've pretty much burned through a lot of days for archery earlier in that month. Yeah. Whereas now my daughter's school, it's a different, we live in a different district than where we work. They still get Monday, Tuesday, I even think they get Wednesday, which is phenomenal, like good for them.

Keep that shit going, but great. But yeah, so I'm all for keeping it what it is, just because, man, that would really screw me big time, yeah. Because I really don't see that coming back now. If it were to come back and we would have off great. I would have nothing to complain about.

And then as far as like the Sunday hunting goes, I'm with you. I am that I could, I want it selfishly again, just because of being a teacher, right? Like [01:08:00] Monday through Friday, right now, there's a national shortage in subs. So it's tough even taking off. So I would like it on that side of things and heck, I wouldn't even care if you would put a time restriction on it.

Like you could only hunt X amount of, from this time to that time. Or, if you want to give me the evening only and make, for people that go to church and all that stuff, that's totally fine. And then you are able to hunt from noon until whatever. I just gimme that extra little bit of an opportunity because I love it.

Like when I look at that and I see November, whatever it's going to be for archery, man I love those opportunities because a working individual let's say for yourself, you take off other days. And you're like, man I have two or three more days that I could designate to hunting and I want to get it done in archery.

You could do that either Thursday, Friday, Monday. You could do that Friday, Monday, Tuesday, depending on the weather. But then when you look at it, you got Friday, Saturday, Sunday, [01:09:00] Monday, Tuesday. There's five straight days that you could get after it compared to. Friday, Saturday, Monday, like that one day Friday, and I don't know, man, how many times that Sunday's always that frigging best day. Oh my gosh.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah, it is. And I have a nephew that has a birthday in November and I always tell my sister, whenever you're having his birthday party, you make sure it's a Sunday.

That's a non-hunting Sunday now. So if Sundays open up to hunting, I'm just gonna have to miss a day of hunting to go to a birthday party. That's

Jeremy Dinsmore: the way it's gonna be. Yeah. No, that's good with, yeah, to What's funny with that the guy I was told you about that went with his buddy on here on an elk hunt that my wife knew and grew up grew up with, she just ran into him and he's, I think recently engaged and they're planning a wedding and.

My wife asked him, how's that going? He goes, good. She wants to get married in the fall. But I told her, it better not happen until after, just not October, November, he said, I was like, all right. He knows what he's doing. I like it. But alright, Taylor, dude I appreciate man, you coming [01:10:00] on talking to me and getting a chance to know you a little bit, dude I'm looking forward to seeing what the what next Buck is gonna, unfortunately gonna have to meet your maker, you and get going for fall yeah.

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. I hope it happens too, but hey, it's, that's hunting man. That is hunting. It's, the possibility is what's addicting. Oh, yeah.

Jeremy Dinsmore: I love it, man. That just the optimistic being optimistic and like we said earlier the drive to be the best that we can be, the process of it all, enjoy it.

And that's the one thing, you, I didn't. Get a chance to talk about it, but when you were saying earlier about just love being in the woods, man, even though I have to drive two and a half hours to go back home to be on the club with my dad or even just by myself up there, I just love going back home and getting up on that mountain.

There's just for something. Yeah. It is a sh a major stress relief for me. It is just, I don't know, man, it's home. Like I could literally just call that home and be okay with it. Yeah. [01:11:00] Your

Taylor Fleischer: wife may not like

Jeremy Dinsmore: it, but Yeah. She, yeah. Who knows, some nights she might. Yeah. Yeah. That's right.

That's right. Taylor, where could people find you fall along with what you got going on and on? Any social media platforms that you would like to mention?

Taylor Fleischer: Yeah. Most of my hunting stuff is on Instagram. My, my handle is steel parvo. That's S t e l P A V r P A r v O.

That's a reference to trapping killing dogs. Yeah that's where I, that's where you can find me. I appreciate

Jeremy Dinsmore: it. Thanks again, everybody. We'll see you next week. Aunt Lura.

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