EP 104: Mule Deer Recap with the Epic Crew

Buck's rutting, he's rutting a doe, I glass him up, and I'm like, holy crap, am I going to do this right now? They've got no snowpack, and so you've got, you know, summer rains that got no snow. Anything to do with Western Big Game.

Welcome to the Epic Outdoors podcast, powered by Under Armour. Hey everybody, it's Jason Carter, Adam Bronson, Jeffrey John, he's been talking, we don't know how much longer we'll let that happen. He's a little mouthy today. Oh, John and Chris Peterson, appreciate you all out there listening. We've got a lot of different listeners that have hit us up, and we sure appreciate you. Some of the things they retain are a little interesting. Then Jeff's getting hit up to be Camp Cook at somebody's hunt. Because we talked about it on the Sheep Podcast.

And there's another name for Camp Cook, but since we have all kinds of listeners, we're going to leave it at that. I think we covered that. Did we cover that? But the Camp Cook is really calm. No, we didn't cover that. We're going to keep her cheap. Moving along. All right. All right. Not yet approved. Anyway, I appreciate you all out there listening, and just want a little shout out to Under Armour for supporting us and all we've got going on here, including our Epic Outdoors podcast as well as the magazine. By the way, the magazine's cranking it out. We're cranking an issue a month for the first six months of the year, if not seven, December through June. Talking about all the western states, drawing odds, kill percentages, and all the important stuff here in the west. That's right. We're cranking on the January now. We should have it done within roughly a week.

We should have the EMAG up at least and go to the printer. But it's always exciting to start talking about the next year's stuff because it's December. Not a lot of hunting left. If you're a big game hunter, not a whole lot going on. So it's Arizona and Wyoming on tap first on the January issue. Yeah, we'll throw in a few little articles here and there. Jeff's going to throw one out there about guided hunts. Of course, we'll talk about wolves and all kinds of fun stuff. But anyway, yeah, so that's coming out soon. Adam talked about a week. We always like to push John, make him a little nervous. He likes it. He's telling us our deadline passed a week ago. Game and Fish hasn't even come out with their stuff yet.

So Adam and I always push. It doesn't speed you guys up at all. Well, Adam will look at me and he'll go, John said our deadline was last week. And I'm like, that means it's next week.

That's a graphic designer for you. They want it done at the printer before the states approve the regs. No, not really. But we do have a tight turnaround because literally we're begging from state fish and game folks, you know, as we speak to get stuff before, you know, it's on the web or anything else. And so we can't go to print until we got something in our hands that we know is reflective of 2019 info. So that's what we kind of wait on. But stay tuned. Stay tuned. Coming shortly. Of course, Adam and I have been up for long periods of time, probably on our second, third, fourth monster in a Diet Coke. Yellow rock star hit me today, too, between the eyes. That felt good. Because the epic office is out. We're allowing people, Adam, we're allowing everybody in the office to partake in monsters, and we need to cut that down. Wait, wait, wait.

Well, the problem is we had about three cases of them here. We're blown through a case a day. And now we got all eight or ten of us back here full time, and it's like they became recreational drinks instead of necessary drinks. You know, I'm thirsty. I'm just going to drink a white moss. And instead of I prescriptive, I need a pick-me-up. It's 2.30, and I'm writing a magazine. So pretty much get out of my way. All right. Let's talk about mules, deers. Yeah, let's talk about some deer. Mule deer. So anyway, we do want to talk about mule deer today. It's one of the, well, we're right in the middle. We're talking a lot on elk in Wyoming, a lot on sheep in Wyoming, getting a lot of those questions. We're not writing about any deer this magazine because there's nothing to talk about in the January magazine at least. For deadlines. For deadlines. But we are fielding a lot of questions.

But we do want to kind of give you maybe a, I don't know, 10,000-foot overview of what happened. West-wide approach this year. Yeah, it was tough. No question about it. You start talking about the southwestern states, Nevada, Arizona, northern Arizona, southern Utah, northern New Mexico, western Colorado. In one word or less, let's go around the room right now. How would you describe the deer hunts? Three words or less. Okay. How about three words or less? Jeff. Me? Yeah. Jeff killed a great one. Jeff killed a 30-inch. That's not fair. So your opinion doesn't matter right now. Well, and I didn't have enough deer tags this year, maybe. Adam, let's talk to you.

Mine, I'll go last. Okay. All right. I'm trying to candy coat the word that came to my mind. I'm trying to think of a synonym that I can say on live podcast. Let's just put it this way. I had a fistful of tags, and I didn't kill a single animal until November, and I started August 10th. How about that? That's right. So put that into three words or less. And I tried to justify it by saying, oh, my kids had all these tags, and they did smoke a lot of animals, six of them to be exact. I mean, we got meat coming out our ears. But. Times of, it's cold and famine right now. Dad needed to kill something, and it was a tough year, let's say that. We ate a lot of tags. Well, I think it was. I mean, I think basically as soon as you drop below maybe the Montana border, cutting down. I love how general it is. Maybe Wyoming border. If you guys can all picture his hands. He's carving out the state.

Yeah, carving out. Like pretty much you move south there, southern Idaho, southern Wyoming, and moving south. It was like. Let's call it south of Saskatchewan. It sucked. Is that what you're saying? Well, I was in Montana, and I'm telling you, the vegetation was unreal. I mean, it really was loaded up. I was quite shocked at that up there. But you four went your deer tag up there. Why? I know. Well, time to get excited about pounding a 135 buck. If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. And by the time you hit November, and you've already done Alaska, Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming, and da-da-da-da, on and on and on. And with an Arizona hunt pending in December 1st. Even though you were Camp Cook, you were a heck of a Camp Cook. Yeah. Yeah, we rocked it, man. Oh.

But no, it was just like, and I think the proof is, is like we've talked about a little bit, like even governor tag guys and stuff, they're still out there trying to find a buck worth killing. And we're talking about, I mean, it's second week of December, third, second week of December. And it's like they haven't seen anything. Well, that just goes to show you, there ain't a lot of bucks out there. It's not a lot of circles. Not only have they not seen anything, they're not getting calls either. And that's just, and these are good hunters, of course, a lot of you guys that are listening. I mean, a lot of people spend a lot of time in the hills, and it just goes to show you, and we talked about earlier in the year, is it was just, it was shaping up to be a tough year. And it was a tough year. We're talking about 200 to 210 deer are nonexistent in a lot of these places.

We're not talking about, oh, nothing 240 plus. We're talking Utah, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada. Nevada. Idaho. Idaho. Wyoming. I mean, there was a couple of good bucks in each state, but honestly, for the numbers and hundreds of thousands. Yeah, but these statewide raffle and auction hunters that are still hunting right now, just going crazy. Not getting a call, not having a buck to hunt. And so the dry year, we'll just call it a drought, it was widespread on these southwestern states, no question about it. So I don't know, I think there was a question on here somewhere about that. Chad Knuckles, appreciate you sending this in to us. Just says, enjoy your magazine research as well as your podcast and have a topic for discussion or Q&A. I'm an avid hunter throughout the West, you could say, certified mule deer junkie.

I hear so often about precipitation, rainfall, moisture affecting antler growth on big game animals from year to year. Completely binded to the theory, but wonder this. His question is, why is in it the driest, most drought-stricken region, southern Utah, northern Arizona, southwest Colorado, and even Mexico, are without question the greatest mule deer locations in the world, year in and year out, produced the largest antler deer with arguably the least amount of rainfall. Some areas receive single-digit inches of rain annually and visibly, at least to the untrained human eye, the elite, flying in the face of drought and produced massive antlers every year. But there is truth. It fills, he's trying to decide whether he buys into that, I guess is what he's saying. And there is truth to that.

You look at a lot of those areas, you look at, you know, northern New Mexico, northern Arizona, southern Utah, southern Nevada, it does look like, wow, how come can they produce it? But, so when you're talking about 8 to 12 inches and you go to 4 to 5, it's monumental. That's kind of what I would say to that, is it's, you can't, you can, you go from 25 to 20 in some of these mountain units, doesn't matter. You go from 8 to 10 to 4, and it's like off the charts, you know, drought. Yeah. And you'd even think with elevation, like you take the Henry's, you know, we've talked a lot about that. Take the Henry's on a drought year, even though, I mean, you're over 10,000 feet, you'd think, oh, there's just going to be enough moisture in the air, things are going to grow. It's not true. There is not the nutrients in those plants that there should be.

They've got no snowpack, and so you've got, you know, summer rains that got no snow for all intents and purposes. And it's a mountain rains that juts out of the desert. It's not on, you know, no nice, you know, flow of a lot of storms anyway to begin with. But, yeah, I just think it's just exacerbated. When you've got a dry area that's capable of producing big deer, like these genetic areas like you rattled off, Chad, I would just say when you add a drought to it, it just magnifies it tenfold. It feels like over a mountain unit that gets 20 plus inches of moisture a year. Well, I think not only that, as we're talking about, when he mentioned southern Utah, northern Arizona, southwest Colorado, Mexico, but some of these areas, like let's just take northern Arizona. So basically let's talk about the strip.

You're so limited in tag numbers that it does seem like it produces better than anywhere else. But it's a lot of it management practices. It's 30 deer. It's 30. 40 deer total dead. You know, 40 tags, 50 tags, 60 tags, depending on the year, and during the rut with no muzzle or season on the strip and things like that. And so I think a lot more plays into it. The Henrys, the Ponsacont, carefully managed. You know, and that's where the animals are coming from. We do have our general seasons, and because you have thousands of people, there's one or two great ones killed. But generally speaking, you know, I think there's a much broader, there's a much more in-depth answer to all of these little intricacies within this question. You know, if you take, like you look at Idaho's bucks, the bucks that they've taken back in the day when it was amazing,

is it's unsurpassed the crazy 40-inch freaking major eye guards, droppers, inlines. It's retarded. Well, if you took those units and managed them as conservative as the Henrys, that we'd be talking about them. Or the Arizona Strip. We'd be talking about them right now. That's right. Instead of a solid general season officer. You crush the books. Yeah. And so, yeah, exactly. And there is something to be said. But like you said, you double the moisture and whatnot. It just, it's a percentage thing, you know. It's, yeah, we are in a drought. We're getting half the rain we're normally used to. It's a total different feed. The deer are feeding on different things versus, you know, 11, 12,000 feet and whatnot. And so, anyway, and you've got places like Region G&H. Adam, I think we'd all agree.

If they managed that and it wasn't over the counter for residents, what do you think would come out of there? Oh, it'd be scary. It'd be retarded. Yeah. It'd be scary. So, it is a product. These areas that we all think of the Mule Der Mecca, the reason they are good is they've been hunted under general season status forever. Henrys, Poncegant, Strip, back in the day. And they had to close them down because they lack the ability to throw out hundreds and thousands of deer every year. You know, I don't mean hundreds of thousands. I mean hundreds and thousands of extra deer a year. They're just not like that type of unit. Under general season, they got crushed to where they had to get closed down. Yeah. And now they're a product of very limited harvest. That's basically. So, it's hard to compare those with units in Colorado.

You get thousands of tags out there in second, third, fourth seasons. And they kill a few big deer out of those, no question. But you're just kind of comparing, you know, a 50 or Henry's 50 total tags on the whole unit. You can't really compare that with anything else. Well, and why would you want it? You're never going to draw. Why would you want it? That's right. And that's, I think, part of why we keep going to Colorado and whatnot. And you hear about the big bucks on social media. There's five killed. And we all hear about every one of them, you know, that are, you know, significant deer. But anyway, it's just a lot of its product of numbers of tags, numbers of hunters. And the downside, like, they could be so much better if they would limit tags. And here we are hunting, you know, third seasons of rut hunt. Starting November 3rd this past year, four seasons of rut hunting.

We have rut rifle hunts. Like, we did away with muzzle to rut hunts back when I was in high school. Yeah. You know. Yeah, we did. Might as well talk about Colorado. Had a lot of questions. So, most, Jeff, you're the one that didn't, I guess. I didn't hunt Colorado. So, mute Jeff's mic for the next 20 minutes. We'll mute it. Well, no, just tell us how bad you wanted to hunt Colorado. I wanted to hunt Colorado. Why didn't you? Why didn't you? You know, we were looking at sheep hunts. You work at a hunting business. What's the problem? I know. I know. I do not see the problem, Jeff. Anyway, yeah, you know, you get down to it. It's a time management factor. And, you know, we had the sheep tag. We ended up turning it back in. When you know you're going to be sheep hunting. I'm thinking about doing Montana deer. Yeah, when you say we, your dad drew a sheep tag in Utah.

He's a max point applicant. And drew, I don't want to call it an oddball unit, but drew a unique unit with very low tag and very low sheep numbers. And, you know, ended up that was planning on being your November. Yes. Yeah, you know. And then when things didn't pan out, you know, didn't find the kind of rams you're after, he decided to turn his pack tag in. And by then, you're at the mercy of whatever hits the leftover list or whatever hits some grungy, you know, landowner list on a piece of paper at Sportsman's. Yes. Oh, man. By a private land only 33 tag and, you know, something like that. Yeah. Yep, that's what I would have been left with. 25 is better than that, but I don't know.

Anyway. So, yeah, you didn't make it. I didn't go. Everybody else had a tag over there. I'm the odd man out. With their name on it. Three of them got punched. Yeah. Three out of the four got punched. John, Chris. Chris, we haven't heard a word from you. Yeah.

Talked about there, huh, first? He's hiding over there. You know, sometimes you can just tell a podcast is going to be really fun. This is why Chris might not want to talk and get teased like crazy. Really? No, just the way. Should we be teased? You guys are on one today. It's a fun one. Well, tell us about your hunt, you guys. Well, I kind of planned mine around. I knew John had drawn a tag, and so I thought it would be good to go with him. And, you know, it's kind of fun to go with somebody. And so he drew a tag, and I ended up finding a tag in the same unit. And so bought a tag, John drew it, and we went to Colorado together. And it sucked. It sucked. Oh. It was the one I hunted last year. I was waiting for you to say. I'm telling you. It was bad. No, it ended up great, but it's funny how a hunt, you got five days. Day four, I told Chris, I don't care if we killed giant bucks.

This hunt sucked. You know? And it was just, we saw hundreds of deer a day and nothing good. Just tiny. Hundreds might be a stretch, but. Not every day. We did see two or three little four points every day, you know. It was, we were seeing deer, but it was, it was bad. Like, I was telling John, I'd rather hunt the Utah General. Like, there are so many people here. You mean the same hunt that John has all the stories about the guy sitting under him and shooting over him, telling him he's going to shoot. Hey! Are we talking that Utah General? Well, that's comparable. How about the same stories where the guy came out and just shot in the dirt to run the deer off? That's the General you're talking about, Chris? No, Utah General without John.

For some reason, John on Utah General attracts. The black cloud follows John in Utah. Bronson and I leave, and pretty soon we're listening to the epic podcast, and we got these guys talking about the Utah General. At least that's right. And I don't hear, we're gone so much right then. I didn't hear about those events until the podcast, because I don't see, we're for weeks at a time, I don't see John and Chris, and then all of a sudden I'm like, whoa, they got into some crap. In Colorado, you're going to shoot your deer, John, right? And this dude walks up, or was it vice versa? Stands on top of you like, what you doing, guys? Yeah. Like, this is in Colorado, too. We had everywhere we went. If it was public land on the map, there were guys there. We had buddies. But yeah, I pull up to shoot the deer, and the guy walks right up.

I looked behind us, and there's a guy walking up, and I'm like, we're shooting a deer right now. He sat down. So he dove down. You've got to come to the Jason Carter training. That deer would have been dead, dead before we even set high. It's true. I need to come to the Jason Carter training. Well, John was setting up on the deer, and I turned around, because I heard a noise, and there's this guy walking up, and he said, I'm not messing you up, am I? And I'm like, we're shooting a deer right now. So he sat down and watched. That's good. That's good, Evan. No pressure. Yeah, he was really cool about it. We had to tell him about opening day. That was funny. We hiked back in. We find a place on the map, try to get away, and we were in probably a mile and a half. Mile and a half from the motel? Mile and a half from the truck. Oh, okay. You know? Just trying to paint an accurate paint. Aerial.

We were probably a mile and a half, and it starts getting light, and we start glassing up people everywhere. You know? There's a group of two up top, horses coming down below. We counted over 20 people the first morning. And we were orange on the mountain walking. Yeah. And we were hiked in. Yeah. And this is a fourth season tag. Uh-huh. Yeah. And probably within... I bet 19 of them were from Utah. I don't know. Well, afterwards we figured out probably most of them were elk hunters. Oh. Yeah. Okay. But... Cow elk. Cow elk. It was kind of rolling hills, and we came over one. And how many elk were in that group? Probably 200. I mean, running out of the mountains, just, you know, bailing off over there. Getting shot at. Yeah. Getting shot at. I like watching stuff like that. When you're out there in Colorado, there's no place like Colorado.

When you get game running from orange, open your sandwich and sit back and watch, because it's fun. It is. I like it. Yeah. It happens every year. But the problem was, first thing that morning, we'd spotted a buck that seemed like a pretty decent buck, had a good frame, and it was like probably two miles away. So we're like, let's go over there. So we start hiking. And we just started seeing people and people and people. And by the time we got there, there was 200 elk right where the deer were. No chance of... No chance. Oh, and on the way in, we had a guy following us. Yeah. And so we were pushing hard just to stay ahead of him. And we're like, what? Is this... Is this on a trail or just on a ridge? No. Just going in. You know? And he could have gone other ways, but he was just on our butts like crazy. And I kept looking back. He's still there. He's still there.

So we were hiking as fast as we could. Yeah. And then finally, when we got up to where we could, you know, see where Chris had glassed that deer, he was on us. And he was just like, you see any elk? I'm like, oh, geez. You know? And then he's like, do you mind if I just keep going? You know? And he kept going. He was a pretty nice kid. Yeah. He was a nice kid. I mean, anyway, but still. But it was deep in your hunt then when things took a turn for the positive, right? Yeah, well, and then to finish that off, I've never had this happen, but bullets were flying over our heads because it was a rolling hills and people couldn't see us, you know, once we crested over. And both of us, we dropped. We proned out. Literally, we laid on the ground. We proned out in a pumpkin suit. And then this raghorn comes right by us. 20 yards from us. He gets small.

And we thought he was going to, but nobody could hit him, I guess, you know? They were shooting at him up above and he ran right next to us. Right next to us. I don't think they could see him anymore, but he started running away from us. That's scary for you. And they were shooting at him right there probably 50 to 100 yards from us. All right. So fast forward to the kills. Anyways, let's kill some stuff. Did the guy watch you smoke your deer? Yeah. Okay. Let's get to that. So you're ready to kill. He's 10 feet away from us. And this is day what? But Chris, the night before, killed the night before on day four. And that was the day I was like. Uneventful? This sucks. Just an easy kill. No big deal. Chip shot with a red rock precision or what was it? Remind me. Yeah. It was a good buck. It had a good back end. I mean, we're seeing nothing for four and a half days.

And we had a day and a half left. And I thought, you know what? If we're going to kill two bucks, we need to get some on the ground. So I saw this buck and he had a really nice back end. Knocked John down. Rutting the does? Or was he rutting the does or long? He was. He was chasing does. And anyway, ended up taking a shot. That's awesome. But people were watching us on that buck too. Just there are people everywhere. So next day. So next day. Last day. We hike in. I mean, it's hiking before dawn. We're sitting there. Right as it starts to get light, we're glassing up deer. And Chris found this buck. And so I get into position, basically. And then the guy walks up on us. Buddy. Did he watch? So what did he do when he smoked him? He just was like, high five you? That was awesome. He's like, good job. You guys care if I keep going? Was he hunting elk? He was hunting elk. He kept hiking.

Oh, wow. Well, it ended well. I mean, it sounded like a grind. You guys killed two really solid bucks. Great looking bucks. And then after, we're like, that was an awesome buck. I can't wait to come back. That was so fun. Yeah. Wait a minute. Earlier, I heard, I don't care if we kill giants. This thing sucks. We did. I still say, I'm not going back. People. Not going back. Well. All right. Nice dark horn bucks. They are good looking deer. Yeah, good looking deer. Of course, you guys know how to take a picture. They look 200. I was like, dude, I don't know what Chris's is, but it's a giant.

It has a dang nice back end. The fronts are a little weak, but. That's good. Good. Nothing wrong with a nice back end. All right. All right. So, a little plug for Red Rock. You guys smoked with Red Rock? Yeah. Yeah. Mine was at 700. And actually, what happened is we ended up taking down a really, really nice Red Rock rifle. It was one of the owners actually told me. He's like, take my rifle. I'm done hunting for the year. Take my rifle. And so, we took it. And I sat up on that deer. And it felt like a 200-yard shot. And I'm not kidding. Wow. Pulled the trigger. And it was awesome. It was dead. Uh-huh. Sweet. Well, just prior to that, we were in western Colorado. Jason and I went to a unit. Third season.

Anticipated some cold and snow. We kind of had a little bit, but. Not much. I mean, it was. I know in other parts of central Colorado, they got a lot more. We really had nothing. Yeah. I mean, for all intents and purposes, like an eighth of an inch of snow on the unit. Yeah. So, we actually, we took on the third season, which is a nine-day season. And Adam and I were both just busy. I was in Nevada trying to make good on a terrible tag and ate it. I was finishing some sheep hunts with Jeff. And then we met up over there probably fourth day into the hunt or something like that. Maybe the fifth day. Whatever that Tuesday. Tuesday, Wednesday. Tuesday, Wednesday. Middle of the season. Middle of the week. Anyway, got in there and I had a buddy of mine kind of, you know, put a few X's on the map. Just like, hey, try here, try here, try here.

Kind of where they winter and where he's, you know, seen bucks in the past. I'm like, oh, just tell me, like, do you know about a specific big deer from last year? Because a lot of times these bucks will kind of rut in the same basic country year after year or migrate to the same winter range year after year and stuff. So, anyway, it's like, no, man, I don't know of anything specific. I'm like, all right, so it was just a matter of just starting to hunt. So, the hunt was on. Adam and I, neither one had ever even stepped foot in the unit before. And that's the one thing we kind of like about Colorado during the rifle. I guess you could call it a rut season even though it was barely a rut season. But as you can get lucky, they migrate. You know, pre-scouting doesn't do a lot of good for hunting in the end of October or November. We were obviously in November.

And so, anyway, we just started grinding it out.

I don't know. It's a pretty short story. You might as well finish your hunt in 30 seconds. Okay. Because that's about how long it took. Well, actually, 20 minutes. 20 minutes of filming. Of watching the deer and then five seconds. You guys. So, anyway, just started driving and glass and driving and glass and basically wanted to get a big overview of the unit. And you just kind of look at stuff and see what you like to hunt and what looks good. And so, I was just spending all day just grinding, just driving. How early did you show up? Little two trackers and all that. Well, I set up my trailer at night. It was after dark. I hadn't even seen the unit in the daylight when I set up my trailer. It was just on the main road. Yeah. And so, anyways. The day before the hunt? No. No. No. Middle of the week? Yeah. Middle of the season. Tuesday or Wednesday? You were there. Middle of the season.

Three day. Oh, middle of the season. Tuesday or Wednesday. It's a high day season, but we started. It ends on a, what is it? Sunday. Sunday. Saturday to Sunday. And I started hunting on Wednesday. And I think I showed up Thursday. Thursday. Yeah. Adam shows up Thursday. I just gave him a pin to my trailer and said, dude, here. Four or five days into the hunt. Basically on your opening morning. Oh, yeah. For you. And that's the opening morning. And so, anyway, just started just driving all day long. Just grinding through it. And anyway, it's kind of weird. It just, heaven sent or whatever. Took a road. Took a road. Took a road. Two trackers. These are little. I mean. Yeah. Adam knows. Yeah. We cranked through it when Adam got there, too. But anyway, hit these two trackers and just never went on the same road twice. And drove to my deer. Okay? Like only Jason Carter. It wasn't something.

It was just one of those things. The buck's rutting. He's rutting a doe. So, I glass him up. And I'm like, holy crap. Am I going to end this right now? And, okay. Back up. I've glassed nice bucks or less than nice bucks with 15s at 100 yards and killed them. And I've been to just a huge amount of ground shrinkage. So, now I'm within 125 yards or whatever. And I'm like, you know, what does this buck really go? I might be big in this thing because I'm too close. Too close, but they're too far to really view just with your eyes, right? You can't put your spotting scope on them either because it gets worse. And swarrow binals, I guess, are too nice. So, you can see every bloodline in them. And so, like, what am I looking at? Like, what am I looking at, you know? So, I'm videoing them and I'm kind of getting amped up.

And the whole time I'm thinking I can hear a side-by-side above me or something going down a ridge. And I'm just thinking, I mean, I would be sick if somebody shot this deer right over my head or whatever. How did John experience? You know? And, but anyway, videoed him. I got an 8-minute clip and a 17-minute clip on my phone. I'm like, man. And his dole was between me and him. And so, in her mannerism, she's just feeding. And so, he's not spooked because she's not spooked. And everything's just kind of happy for a minute, right? And so, I'm like, I feel, I don't feel pressure to just end it. But at the same time, and I had a little cell service. I'm thinking, I'm going to send Bronson a freaking steel clip of this or something. And get like, hey, am I seeing what I see? Do you, do you, give me your stamp of approval.

It did go through my mind. It did, you know. So, anyway, long story short, I just, I got, I decided, I thought this would make a great kill scene. And I got ready and I freaking couldn't get steady. I don't know. I actually got nervous after 25 minutes. I guess it just, I don't know. So, anyway, got steady. And just as he walked out of the scene. Boom. Yeah, I shot him. Smoked him. Little shout out to Phone Scope as well. Of course, I videoed my buck. It was on a Swaro 65. The little scope. The little scope. 25 yards. The little scope. Yeah, the little one. I snapped off the 95, threw on the 65, left the 95 for the BTXs. All this quick coupling going on while there's a 206 buck stern out of it, 110 yards. Did you hear the audio? It sounds like a wreck. I got chiz going everywhere. Yeah. Dude, he didn't care. He was eye on the dough, concentrating on her. She was feeding.

There seemed to be no problem. I videoed it. So, anyway, thanks to Phone Scope.

Great job. Great products. Easy to use. And go to PhoneScope.com. But old Justin's a good friend of ours and produces good products. Yep. P-H-O-N-E-S-K-O-P-E.com. Walked up on him. And, of course, you know, just an awesome deer. A lot of mass. Like Jeff said, he's tripping with mass. He does have a couple little teardrops. And he just is one of those heavy deer that you feel really fortunate to kill. And it was one of those. It was eight hours into the hunt, ten hours into the hunt. And the whole time, I'm like, and we're staying. Bronson and I are staying for each other's hunting. We're staying to the end. And I'm like, we're going to kill a freaking 220. Bronson is going to kill a 220. This is just retarded off the charts. It's cold. This buck was rutting. It's amazing. Everything's going to be rutting. They're going to be walking up to our trailer.

And I'm getting those, as I'm getting to Colorado, all that. You're getting the text. I'm like, that sounds good to me because I got Jason Carter looking for me for the next four or five days. Honestly, I tried. I tried. I'm not like, sign me up. I'm realizing I'm already signed up. I'm signed up.

I'm like, giddy. I'm driving to Green River. You are. I'm giddy. I'm waving to everybody I see. It's all butterflies and flowers for me driving to Colorado. You know, it's like, this is good. We're going to kill it. We're going to kill it. Yeah. All right. And then I get there. You see the deer. And I'm like, yeah. First thing I remember saying to you, I'm like, I'm glad I wasn't with you that night. Because I have an idea of how this would have ended. You'd have killed him. I don't let you kill him. And I'm like, we'd have been there together. And we'd have both been kind of jostling, grabbing scopes, grabbing, well, yeah, I don't need that. And I'm looking at binos. And you'd be like, Johnson, you better kill that buck. Because if you were hesitant at all, but you knew there was two tags in there. License to go. I know Jason would have told me, smoke that deer.

You better shoot that deer. Because I don't like the final decision and then just the anticipation of ground drinking or whatever. And then I would have walked up there and been like, holy, that's a good deer. And I would have said, you're right, and you're staying here until Sunday. And I would have. And you would have. And the rest of the week, I would have been, you know, just busting my, you know what. No, the butterflies would have been gone. It would have been the reality of there's nothing here like that buck. And that's, because that's basically what we ended up getting to. So the next, how many days would it be? Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday? The next four days sucked. Yeah. Okay? And we were wearing vehicles out. We're wearing backpacks out. We're wearing boots. I mean, we're doing everything. We're doing everything, John. Jeff, you listening? Yeah, I'm listening.

I mean, there's, we pull, we did everything short of run trail cameras because it's freaking 10 degrees. Yeah. Okay? Right? Yeah, exactly. And we'd seen, I mean, not a lot of mature bucks. I mean, when I say mature, I'm talking four or five-plus-year-old deer. They're, you know, 170-plus. Not a lot of those deer. And we saw a couple that they're four-by-threes or weird-looking, you know, bucks that you just weren't going to shoot. But not like you're passing a bunch of solid bucks. It was a dry spell. It really was. And I remember the last morning in my hunt, I pull it to this glass and knob. I'd seen a bunch of does a couple days before thinking maybe something's moving in here. And there's a little buck back here, back here right off the road. And I see a truck parked right there. And I'm like, oh, this is funny. This thing's going to get smoked. And so it goes back to the elk thing.

I'm like, oh, nothing's here. I'm going to watch a deer get smoked.

So I start watching. And I see a lady get out of the truck. She's got her gun. She goes up there and looks. And all of a sudden, she runs over. It's in a burned area. She runs over. She gets down on the dead log. You know, she's 50 feet or whatever off the road. Smokes this buck. It goes down. And I'm expecting her husband, boyfriend, somebody to get out of the truck. And she walks over to the deer. She walks over back to the truck. You know, it's only 200 yards back. And I'm realizing she's all by herself. And I don't see a knife yet. And I'm like.

And it's the last morning. It's prime time. Prime time. Prime time. One hour after the day. I'm like, well, all right. So I'm like, I better at least go ask. And I see her holding the phone up to her head. And I'm like, there's not very good service right here. So I go over there. And I said, do you need help? Yes. I have a knife somewhere in my truck. But it's really messy. And I can't find it. And you're like. And I'm like, you're really. I was just asking to be nice, for the record. I can't get bloody right now. Because I've got a hunt to do. No. So I'm like, well, maybe I can just. I'm like, well, you got help close to town. Yeah, I got help back at town. But I can't get ahold of anybody. All that. And I'm like, well, maybe I can just help her drag it whole. And throw it in the back of her truck. And say, all right, go to town. And sort of that. Yeah. Call it a deer.

Well, it's uphill. And it's a mature deer. But it's like a heavy buck. And I'm like, we started dragging. And I'm like, this ain't going to work. So I said, let me go to my truck. So I went and got the truck. And I don't know when the last time I've gutted a deer was. Well, we don't. We take off the quarters. We quarter them in the field. Gutless method. And gutless. I don't gut deer. We'll even reach in and get the tenderloins. Yeah. Right under the. I was joking to Jason after this that I haven't taught my 13-year-old kid how to gut an animal. Well, me neither. Because you'd have to gut it. And that's not fun. We quarter it. And they can help. They know how to do that. He can help me do that. He knows where to find the joints and all that. But anyway, so I'm over there. And I'm like, I'm going to get bloody. I'm going to get so bloody.

You know, because you've got to reach in, cut the windpipe up, that whole thing, diaphragm. And I rip them out in five minutes. And it's there. And I drag it to the truck. And then I'm just dripping everywhere, you know, with wet blood. You know, she smoked this buck. Sent her on her way. And, you know, she was, you know, back. The whole time I'm texting Adam, I'm like, hey. How are you doing? And he goes. Nothing. And finally, I think you replied off to look. And you're like, dude, I spent prime time. Gutting someone's deer. Ebbled deep in guts. That's right. And I just felt bad. But then I'm thinking, all right, we're done. I wiped myself off of the truck. And it's an awesome day. It's foggy. A little bit of snow is coming down. It's cold. I've done my good turn daily. Yes. And something good is going to happen. Well, it didn't. It didn't. I found a buck.

I sent a picture of a buck to Adam because he gets a little cell service up there. And I had to drive to cell service. And this was like a 28-inch buck that I wanted to make 35 inches wide. And I'm like, Bronson, I'm like the dog that wants the good pat on the back. I'm like, Bronson, I got a shooter for you. And I sent him the picture. And he goes, have you seen anything else? I'm like, we have been taught by John how to take pictures. We can make this look giant. But that's all he was. He had that wide look. And Bronson's like, keep looking. Well, and he was just a buck. But anyway, to fast forward to that night, this is the last night of the hunt. Nothing during the day. We kind of load up some of the stuff back towards camp at a sandwich. And we're going to hunt until dark because it's dark at 530 or whatever. And you can still drive home to Utah by midnight after that.

So we were split up that night. Not very far apart because we kind of started to converge in an area that night. We were only two, three miles away, Jason and I. And I glassed a buck. And he's right out in front of where I would have thought every deer with four points would be dead by now. Because there's people everywhere. He was under trailers and trucks and people. And he's out there just lip-trolling, rutting this doe. Right out in a sagebrush. You know, he's probably 600 yards from me. I'm glassing from a hairpin kind of corner on the road. And, you know, it's a big valley sagebrush. And I'm like, oh, he's a pretty nice buck. Long beams, tall, boxy. And then I, it's kind of fun to shoot stuff, right? But I'm like, well, wait a minute. You know, Jason videoed his buck for a while before he shot it. So I get in. I get my spot scope out. My phone scope hooked up to it.

I'm like, I don't know if I'll do 20 minutes of video. But I'm going to get some before. In the meantime, I hit him up. So I didn't even know he was videoing this buck. And I'm like, hey, what you seeing? You know, and he's like, well, you know, I got a pretty nice buck. And I said, well, what does that mean? Because Bronson always kind of, he's very calm when he finds something big. And I said, well, what does that mean? He's like, well, I'm, I said, no, are you thinking about shooting him? Well, I'm like, all right, I'll be there in three minutes. Okay. I roll up doing 65 and a 35. Cloud of freaking dust. It envelops us and everything. And I get out. You've been videoing it for how long? Yeah, I don't know. Not 20, but five or six minutes. And I was putting my stuff back in my truck when Jason got there. He's like, what you doing? I said, you're too late.

I'm like, dude, did you shoot him? He goes, no. That pumpkin down there shot him. I'm like, you're kidding me. He's like, yeah, dude, I didn't even know he was here. Freaking guy. I hear a gunshot. I see no buck. And he was dressed like he'd been sitting in this little canyon all day. Like, he didn't just get out of it. There's no trucks anywhere near us. He'd been sitting in that draw all afternoon waiting for bucks to come out. So, anyway, he smoked the buck. Well, then he couldn't find it. And I'm like, dude, he can't find it. I'm out watching him. And he's going back and forth. And there's about 30 or 45 minutes of daylight left. So, I told Jason, I said, I'm leaving because I might find something else down here. And Jason's like, well, I'm going to at least see if he finds his deer. For a minute. For a minute. And then finally, I'm like, I'm leaving. I mean, it's, again, primetime.

Yeah. You know. So, anyway. We saw, what, one or two? Well, and I like to call that deer. I like to call him 190, but he's not. He's not. Jason likes to say that if he had been 190 plus, I would have shot him. I wouldn't have videoed him like Jason likes to do with his buck prior to killing by himself. I would have just shot him. And I just said, hey, get over here. We've got to take some pictures. You know. But, anyway. So, he wasn't a really well built. Although, I will tell you this. This is what Brownson says. And I look at the video and I agree 100%. Dude, he's got freaking big G2s. His G3s are awesome. Dude. His G4s follow the beam. They're longer than they look. I'm like, you're right. And his beams are awesome. And, by the way, he's got two and a half inch eye guards. And decent mass. I'm like, where's the weakness? Where's the weakness?

When they don't have a weakness, they're bigger than you think. I got a challenge for you, Adam. He was just a boxy color. I had a box. Just a nice. Dude, he was awesome. You've got five, six minutes of video. What's that? Let's see a picture of this boat posted on Brownson Outfitting Web page. Ooh, there's a challenge. It's now somebody else's buck, and I don't have their permission to do that. Oh. Because he smoked fringe. He smoked it. I've still never seen a picture of this deer. It was a nice deer. Nice buck. It was a nice deer. After this podcast, we'll break it out. Rib him a little bit more. So anyway, it was terrible. Colorado's done. It was a tough year. Yeah. And we went to Idaho, Adam. We covered the west. Even we talked about New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada. And what is interesting, and I actually thought Idaho would be decent,

but I didn't take into account how bad the die-off is. A couple years ago. Yeah. And it just crushed the deer, and they're just crushed on top of the drought. And so it can't be this bad two years in a row. So Adam and I are convinced, as well as Jeff and John and Kristen, we're geared up, and we're going to hit it hard again. Can't wait to flip the calendar in about three weeks. Yeah. Flip the calendar. 2019. Flip it. Flip the calendar. I still wouldn't put a lot of stock into Idaho. It's terrible. But Jeff, you killed a freaking great buck. Well, I killed a great buck, but, you know, and I talked to several other guys that killed, you know, just nice deer. But it feels like, and everybody feels the same way, it feels like you were killing the last buck that was on the mountain. Yeah. And we had a little bit of an experience. Me and Jason had a little bit of an experience,

like people all over the place, when I killed my buck. But it's just like. We felt like we extracted one with a scalpel. It was like we went in there, shot him, and walked out. Well, you walked out. Yes. I was like, Adam's like, dude, does he's got his QU 7,200? And I go, yes. And he goes, he'll be fine.

I don't know where I was. He told me that, and I'm like. I was probably guiding sheep because that was the end of October sometime, or mid-October sometime. I wasn't up there, but I'm getting the play-by-play. Jeff's about to smoke a pretty good buck. And I'm like, all right. And he smoked it. And I'm like, oh, you got to go pack it out. And he says, not sure yet. And that's what I said. He's got a 7,200 QU? Yes. I'm like, he's good. I'm like, hey, Jeff, boned it out. It was heavy, man. That was the heaviest load I've taken. It was heavy. He said, hey, Jeff, boned it out. I'll meet you at the trailhead. By the time I'd have got in there, let's be honest. Okay. I'd help any of y'all out, and I have. By the time I'd have got to Jeff, and I didn't want to wait through. I got to go around the private. It was aggressive. I mean, it's aggressive. Well, we had four more tags to fill.

Like, we had Jason's daughter and my two boys. And three more tags to fill. This buck I found a little bit early, and I thought, you know, Jeff, the kids. This isn't a kid's buck. There's bucks you can kill with kids. This buck, if he would have been killable with ash, I would have. I could have. And you didn't have a tag here. No, I didn't have a tag. I would have had to have ash shoot it. Like, that's just what you do. But this is a buck for adults. It was very aggressive. You had to watch your onyx maps. You had to deal with other hunters. You had to make a good shot opportunity. You know what I mean? So, anyway, lucky for Jeff. But having said that, he shows up at the trailhead, and I'm like, man, he looks heavily laden, heavily burdened. And I go over there, and I go, dude, that's a legit pack. And he's like, yeah, I didn't even bone out the last quarter. I was too tired.

So, he had a quarter with bone in. I'm just, I'm going. Full meat. Full cape. Okay, full cape. And the skull, everything. Everything was in his pack. And his pack. And his gun. All that. Tripod. By the way, since we're talking about Jeff's 7200 pack out, we really appreciate QU. They were the first advertiser on board with us here at Epic Outdoors. Jason Harrison was a good friend of all of ours. And we appreciate QU's support. Brendan Burns as well. Super good guy. He's out there doing what he says he does. He's an incredible hunter and does a great job. And so, they know gear. They're making some of the best gear out there. They produce everything, Bronson. I mean, from freaking tents, sleeping bags, gear, camels. Clothing, everything. Layering systems, all that. From rain gear to base layers and everything. Give them a call or visit their website at QU.com. K-U-I-U dot com.

You must buy direct. There's no retailers for that. That's part of their system and always has been. Pass the savings on to the consumer that buys it. So, QU.com. If you do want to call, you can call them at 855-367-5848. But everything's online. Great time. We usually have some specials going on around Christmas too. So, keep an eye out for that. Anyway, so long story short, we're excited about next year. Can't be two bad years in a row. We're actually, Bronson made a good point the other morning. Made me feel a little better. We already had more moisture than we can remember having all of last year. Well, October alone was unbelievable. I mean down. I mean, this doesn't help anything for the hunts down here. But for southern Utah, northern Arizona, southern Nevada, it rained and even snowed. But rained like crazy. Everything. Flooding, flash flood.

I was doing some sheep hunts at the time and it was just crazy. So, yeah. I think it charged the ground up quite a bit. And our winter's not great, but it's early. I mean, it's December. Early December. So, we're not judging anything now. But it rarely is two terrible, terrible ones back to back. So, we'll see. Anyway. So, we're excited about it. We're super pumped about everything that we've got going on. You know. Anyway. So, Bronson does have a hunt. His kid's got a hunt. My kid drew a New Mexico deer tag, archery deer tag. I'm not sure about that one. I'm kind of tired. And the kid's already killed about everything he needs to kill. He's a killing machine. He's a killing machine. So, anyway. Want to thank Outdoor Edge. We've used their knives extensively throughout the fall. I carved up six animals for my kids and then a couple for myself.

I know Bronson and all you guys have used them as well. The blades are awesome. They're stout. They're big. There's none of this, you know, break them and jam them into your hand. You can still cut yourself. They're very sharp. But, you know, Adam made a comment the other day. They hold their edge for an entire animal. Well, and they're, yeah, when you're caping a sheep or something, I don't want one as sharp as some of those other knives. You know, they're sharp enough. Let's put it that way. And they keep an edge longer. There's no question. So, and we do have an Epic Outdoor Series Outdoor Edge knife right now. The only way to get one is we've got a membership drive and a hunt giveaway going on right now. You've got six hunts we're giving away. And if you buy the $200 or $500 packages, you get a free Outdoor Edge Epic Outdoors knife with that.

So more details on our website or in the magazine, but on the website at epicoutdoors.com if you're interested in picking up one of those free knives with a hunt giveaway purchase. So, anyway, awesome knives. Got a couple more questions. We might as well just blow through them. They're deer related. And then we'll kind of have this deer podcast kind of, for now, all tied up. There's one from Clay. It says, hey, guys, since it's that time of year, I'd love to hear about how you go about hunting a late season mule deer tag. Do you get out more to the remote areas or focus more on the covering country as quick as possible? I think we've talked about some of that. I mean, Chris and John, you tried to get back in. And not always can you get away from people. Jason and I, our unit was you couldn't get away from people and remote. There was not really remote areas. It was a unit.

Partly why we looked at that is it didn't have any 10,000 to 12,000 foot high country. We thought we can hunt the whole unit from start to finish. We don't need the migration or snow. But I guess generally, depending how late, if you're talking third season in Colorado, that's not always like late season stupid bucks standing around. And you're going to have to get away from stuff. If you get a four season hunt and generally the people, at least the deer hunters, start letting up, you can go to the easiest areas in the unit sometimes. Not maybe where you guys were, but other areas that have 10 to say 50 four season tags. And you can hunt the normal easy areas because that little extra pressure, you know, subsiding, bucks will start sticking their nose out. So it depends really how late, I guess, is probably the best answer for that.

But if it's low, low tag numbers, just cover the numbers of deer until you find a buck. I like that. And then also, Adam, you know, we've talked about this a lot is there's limited numbers of elk hunters too, four season. The positives are limited tags, limited people. That's always great. You get a little rut. Short five-day hunts is the negative. That's the negative. And whenever the weather hits, especially in Colorado. Second, third, or fourth. That's probably true about anywhere. When the weather hits, you're going to have better hunting. If it's second, third, or fourth. So a lot of people will wait for three, four years until they see the dates are going to kick late in the unit they want. And I'll contend, and I've been on it back-to-back years, when the hunt's early as it's going to get and the next year late as it's going to get,

and the early year was way better just because we had the snow. And so weather right prior to your hunt or during your hunt, in my opinion, makes more difference than a date on a calendar. And it depends on where you're at. We're talking Colorado there, you know, second, third, fourth Colorado. But, you know, Jason, you've worked hard in Idaho and kind of seen similar things up there. And, you know, up there, depending on the hunt, kind of depending, like, I remember when we went up there and you killed that 221-inch buck. Man, Jason says, he tells me like ten times, he's like, you just got to cover the numbers, cover the numbers. But, you know, quit staring at small deer. That year, the writing was on the wall. There were deer everywhere. It was the end of October. The early snows had hit. And it was like, cover the numbers. There's a shooter here right here. I had a buddy tell me.

He's like, dude, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm hanging out with Mama. He's like, you need to get up here now. They start rutting. They rut earlier in Idaho. And I don't know what it is, but, you know, anyway, they rut. The 25th, they get going pretty good. You even found that with your kid. You shot a buck October 20th, Jeff, remember? Yes. And he was chasing. And he was rutting. So, anyway, and so, yeah, Jeff was with me. I'm like, Jeff, he's not the target animal. Yeah, but this is a nice buck. I'm like, you going to will some cheaters on him? Get going. Let's freaking cover the numbers. And so, anyway, there's another question here. I thought this would be fun, but what's the number one thing you look for in a buck? Mass, width, deep times, extra points? How about yes? There's people. All of it. I know there's people. If it's got a split eye guard, it's getting dumped.

You know, like if it's got a half-inch kicker, it's going down. That's true. I've got some people I've known like that, but what about you guys? What's your personal? I'm one of those guys. I wasn't talking about you, John. If it's brown, it's down. I think the number one thing, like I've grown, I always like width. Everybody likes width. A good wide deer is a freaking big frame. It looks good. I like frames, and they can be 24-inch or 25-inch if they've got a big frame. That's just me. I like a frame, and I know that sounds really stupid. Like, who doesn't like it? Because if it's 24 or 5 inches, and it's got a good frame, it means it's going to have really long tines and all that. But sometimes he's 30 inches, and you just got a big, airy-looking frame, and, you know, maybe he doesn't score, you know, that high, you know? And so that's me. Might kill him, too.

Like, I mean, every buck's... I don't have to have cheaters. I don't, you know, but mass and a frame. I need mass. I personally need mass. You know, I've grown out of the width thing, and part of that, and I hate to say Ben and Crockett score, but you can get a freaking 35-inch. I got a 35-inch, or he's got a 22-inch inside spread, inside the beans. And so score-wise, it's beautiful, you know, but it doesn't necessarily matter. And it's not all about score, but I'm telling you, the reason why I like mass is if they're massive, they've got longer tines than you think. Every point will be longer than you're giving them credit for. That's right. When you walk up to them. And with mass, I love big freaking eye guards. And if there's three of them, that's better, you know? Big ones. Big. And even basal points that don't score. Just stuff down low that maybe isn't even scorable.

John, you guys at Colorado, you had some of that. You know, stuff that's not scorable. I've been over there fondling your buck. I mean, it's got three or four points around the base. I'm like, dude, what's up? You didn't tell us about this. Well, anyway, so, yeah. Extra points, how about yes? We all, I mean, nothing wrong with that. But some people like a great big old typical. And I do, too. And you know what? People always say, you know, big typicals are easy to find. Book typical is nothing compared to a book non-typical. Go kill one. Okay? Go kill one. To judge a big typical, and Adam and I have talked about this a lot, they are hard to judge. And try to judge a main beam. We've killed bucks with 29-inch main beams. We actually saw a picture of a buck that got killed that I have trail camera pictures of. 27 or something. Dude, they're 27, 26, 27. Oh, they're 23s. They look 23.

So, anyway, I don't know. What's the next question on there? Let's see. And then let's go to lunch. This guy, Forrest, is a desert southwest type guy here. He says, you know, it's a 198 typical shot in an obscure unit during a January archery rut hunt, which probably New Mexico, Arizona, I'm guessing. But can one big buck in a desert unit be telling of the unit's potential?

And take it away, Jim. Well, I don't know. Yeah, you shoot that buck. When you find a big buck, you shoot him, and you don't worry too much about the rest. But having said that, that all depends. Some of these bucks will migrate from, let's say it's the 2B in New Mexico, and it migrates from the hickory or it migrates from Colorado. It's hard to tell what that unit's potential was or truly is. You can tell what the migrating buck's potential is and the genetics. But anyway, it's a little bit tough. I don't think you can base anything off of one buck. We've seen one buck hit wonders in some of our units. And you're like, why did that happen and this and that. I mean, we obviously like to go where genetically you've got a little bit of history. I've got a little red dot on my map. Everywhere in Nevada we've killed a 200-incher. And that keeps you going. It's the knowledge that there's more.

We've been there. The blood's there. The blood's there. It's happened. You have anything to add? No, I agree. And I don't. I mean, on some of our general season hunts, whether it be a Utah general that we don't, we frankly usually don't put as much time into them as we probably should because we get busy doing other stuff. Or Idaho. You can pull out something, you know, that maybe you don't expect or you shouldn't have killed or whatever. But generally, we like to go where stuff's more stacked in our favor. And that's just, you know, whether it be a general season hunt or whether it be a state that's got the type of genetics in that part of the state. You know, we're trying to be a hero somewhere. If you've got a part of the world that you got dialed in and you're doing it, keep after it.

And generally, doing that consistently year after year after year, five, ten years in a row, it'll usually peter out here pretty quick. You just, if you're in an obscure place like that. But that's my two cents. And we also know, Adam, you know, of a buck that was killed that was like 240 in a particular unit that we've hunted. And we know the genetics aren't there for that kind of buck. I mean, it hasn't been one killed like that since the 60s. And I think there was one then, you know. And so, anyway, just, guy got super lucky. You know, it was a special deer. It was special genetics with the right doe, the right buck or whatever. But generally speaking, we know that's known for 190s and a very, very rare to kill a 200-inch or so. Anyway, hunt where they make them. But you should hunt close to home too because you can scout it often. So, that's my opinion.

In your opinion, what are the best late season hunt options for mule deer? I've heard New Mexico can be awesome. New Mexico and awesome. I'm not sure. I've heard New Mexico can be awesome, but I'm not sure where to start looking for an opportunity. I guess it depends on, you know, my, I would just call late season November hunts. But, you know, Ben, I don't know if you're thinking December or January or what your definition of late is. But because if you're talking that late, your options are really limited to, yeah, maybe New Mexico, a late archery January 2B2C. Or going to Arizona or an Eastern Plains in December, things like that. But the best late season options, we've talked so much about Colorado today. And part of the reason we're doing that is we can talk about late season rifle hunts in Arizona or Nevada until we're blue in the face.

And you're not going to draw very many tags, if ever, in some of those places. So we're not talking about them. They exist and they're awesome. The strip, the late kaibab, the late hunts in Nevada. But very few people are ever going to draw those. And so you're talking to such a few people. We talk about Colorado. If you're a rifle hunter, you should go to Colorado as often as you can, whether it be on draw tags, landowner tags, or just, you know, whatever. Go to Colorado as many times as you can. Because just like this with Jason, I don't know, Jason, we've hunted Colorado most years for 10-plus years. And you don't kill a deer every time you go there. But it might. You come around the corner and, boom, there's a 206 and it ended great. And that's what can happen.

And you go to Colorado because it's got the genetics and you've got just enough of the rut, potentially, if you get the right weather to make it happen. But in every unit, you've got some issues in Colorado, whether it be the private land, whether it be the number of hunters like Chris and John are talking about, or whatever. But you've always got a chance, you know, always in Colorado. And that's what's funny. Chris, you've killed a 200-incher in Colorado, right? Yep. Adam, you've killed a couple 200-inches in Colorado. On units that we didn't necessarily know that much about, I've killed a couple. It's just one of those things you kind of do it. You go, you plan for Colorado and you do it and you gain points. And we can help you gain points with our license application service and whatnot and also help you choose units.

It's the only unit you can really consistently go on what I would call a late-season deer hunt. That's why we go there. We're usually done in October with our other stuff in Utah. You can go to Colorado. With minimum zero to two points, you can go if you want. And cheaper land on our tags or watch the leftover list or whatever. Other states, like late-season Idaho, a few archery over-the-counters. But the rifle hunts are all strictly controlled draw like they are in Arizona and everywhere else. And you're generally not going to get a tag every 10 years. Montana has basically a late where you're hunting in November. It's over-the-counter for residents. It's not managed. It just gets crushed. Just deer hunting. A lot less. And Adam had a late-season 128 in Wyoming, I mean, and killed a great buck. Like, there are those opportunities. I'm telling you, we apply for them.

Had 12 or 13 max points. And so that's what I'm saying, though. You can't say what's the best one because every state's got them, but they're the hardest tags to ever draw on. They're the hardest. So you just can't get your heart set on them unless you've got the points built up that you can do something. Max points in Arizona. And you're looking at one of the late hunts or the strip or the Kaibab. Yeah, you should talk about that. And if you don't, just apply for them and forget about that you even did it. And if it happens, deal with it then. Yeah. I had a guy hit me up yesterday. Adam and I were talking. Of course, we consult every day, and that's part of the membership is we consult clients, you know, all day long. And anyway, and it's awesome. We love doing it. But anyway, a guy was hitting me up. Hey, I'm thinking about a Region H tag. I'm thinking about a General Season Utah tag.

And I'm thinking about a, you know, kind of what we would consider an inferior unit in Colorado. You know, what would you do? Would you do all three or would you just do one and go to Nevada and just do one? I'm like, you should do one. And just do it like it's the only tag you have and it's the last deer hunt you'll ever do in your life. And you're going to kill a great buck if you really spend the time scouting and working it. But sometimes we get spread too thin trying to do everything. And I spread, Adam and I, we hear of all these opportunities. And we write about them and we get excited. Pretty soon I'm excited about antelope. But I'm thinking, what, what am I doing? Reset. Boom. Hit the reset button. Reset. Next day is a new day. And then I'm excited about antelope again because we're doing all this research. And can you believe what's going on in this unit and that unit?

So we get excited and we're the tag junkies. And we end up eating tags and spreading ourselves too thin. But that's also part of the game and learning units and hunting the West. And that's what we do is, you know, is to gain knowledge. You guys all hunted new units. Jeff, you hunted new units this year. Went to Montana. Freaking hunted Elko, you know, on the general. Learned all about block management. Adam's doing the same thing. I'm doing the same thing. And so, anyway, it's a lot of fun. But by doing that, you do limit your trophy potential and whatnot. And so, anyway, that's a little bit of a deviation from that particular question on late season hunts. But for now, let's call it a day. Kent's Optics, they're awesome. Speaking of Christmas, I went up there and I've ordered up some Christmas gifts. My relatives need a little something-something. And these guys are awesome.

They have great prices. The best prices I've found. They have everything from optics, rangefinders, rifle scopes, everything. I mean, vinyl cases, all kinds of little knickknacks. They're the best in the business that I've ever come across. These guys are hardcore. They kill stuff. They use stuff that kills stuff. They know the best gear. Give them a holler. It's Kent's Optics, number 435-257-7014. Kent's Optics.com. They're going to be in a booth. They share a booth with us up here at the Expo. Bring all kinds of crazy, amazing sheds that are world-class, specific bucks. And with, you know, the last couple decades, named bucks, they've got sheds too. Bucks that have been killed by special, important people. So, anyway, super good guys. And give them a holler. It's Christmas season. I know I've got some stuff on order. All right, boys. It's time for lunch. But we're out. We're out.