Ep 151: Applying in Nevada, Montana, Kansas and Covid19.

When you draw a Nevada tag, for the most part, you've got something. Overall, sheep in Nevada, we're a huge fan. We are advocates of planning in Montana. Kansas, what a great state, huh? Anything to do with Western big game.

Welcome to the Epic Outdoors podcast, powered by Under Armour. Hey everybody, Jason Carter, Adam Bronson, Chris Peterson. He's at the keyboard and coming at you from Southern Utah. In our office, all together, not working remotely yet, right, Bronson? No, 9.5 employees here today, so we're good. 9.5, we've got room for a .5. Anyway, 10 or less, right? Or is it up to 9? I don't know, we're talking. 10 or less. Kind of like up to 10% on draws, or guaranteed 10%, or no more than 10%. Those are all up to interpretation we're finding out, especially thanks to New Mexico. Who knows anymore? That's right. But anyway, how are they going to police the 10? They're going to... All right, who's the latest man on a totem pole? Go home. I don't know. Anyway. Who knows, but we're still working... It's going to be interesting to see around here if we ever do have to break 10.

Who's the late one that thinks they're going to get here at 7.59.50 or something? I'm the 11th guy. I guess I've got to go home today, guys. See ya. Unlike a lot of work environments, I think people want to work here, huh? Absolutely. Come on. Who doesn't want to work here? We've got springs in the air a little bit. Yeah. Turkeys might be starting to gobble. It's snowing. Turkey gobbled, then he got a snowstorm. That's right. He's leaving tracks in six to ten inches of snow.

Anyway, yeah, kind of crazy weather. We spent a little time, went and ran over, looked at some new units there in Nevada. Bronson, you were out and about a little bit on Saturday. Trying to do a little bit of that. It's that time of year. We got a new mag to the printer, and that's what prompted a little bit of chain. We were unshackled briefly. That feels like. That does feel a little bit unshackling that occurred. We've got the fourth state magazine of the year. We've got the April magazines at the printer. Our e-mags live and online for all those that maybe didn't get our email telling the world about it. But that's what we're going to talk about today. Yeah. Before we do, let's thank Under Armour. Thank you, Under Armour. We do appreciate Under Armour. They're sponsoring this podcast. Of course, I think they're working from home. At least they say they're working.

I don't know if they're really working. How do you check up on people? Do we have to have trail cameras? The new Fusion Stealth Cam could send us remote live pictures of our employees working from home just to make sure they're working. What do you think, Chris? Do you think it'd go? That'd be interesting. Interesting concept. If you want to donate the Fusion, I'm all about it. Well, we ordered a bunch of them. We haven't got them yet. By the way, Bronson, take it away. Okay. Well, this podcast, we are going to give away a trail cam. Why are we going to give away a trail cam? Because we are all new stealth cam dealers, among other things, which we will be announcing very soon as well. Let's do it in this podcast. Something that we actually spend a lot of time on. We go through those ourselves, both between ourselves and some of the guides we use are friends, families, blah, blah, blah.

So we've got a dealership. And so we do want to give away one of those today, but we're not going to give the details quite yet, right? We're going to make them listen to the rest of the podcast, Chris. I think that's a good idea. Yeah, right. But stay tuned. Maybe in the middle. Maybe we'll throw it in the middle or something. That's right. I'm not going to make you tell the closing credits, but it's kind of exciting. It's scrolled to the end. We want them to hear every word we have to say. Don't you think? That's right. Huh. But give away a new G45. GX. Yeah, the NG Max. They're awesome. In fact, you know, when they first came out with those, of course, you're always nervous, right? And so I went and put every model they had on the trees at my house, and it was unbelievable. I mean, I would just crack the door at my garage, and they'd be snapping photos. I don't know. I'm shooting.

It's roughly a 40-yard, 45-yard shot. Stray dogs? No, that was your dog. Oh, yeah. No, I had stray dogs coming in, playing with my dog all night, and I'd be like, Oh. Now I know. Now I know. Come over. Now I know who to. Where all the food has gone. Anyway, yeah. So, yeah, sometimes you got to test them out. And so, anyway, that's what I ran last year is those 45 NG Maxes. We get a lot of questions about that. So we ordered a freaking load of them, and they are for sale. They're going to sell them. Make a great deal for anybody. All right. Having said that, let's move on. Should we? Do it. What should we talk about, Bronson? Well, let's kick it off with the states that we talk about in this magazine, but let's start off with Nevada. This is the April issue, 2020, Epic Outdoors, Nevada, all species, Montana, sheep, moose, goat, bison, and antelope, as well as Kansas whitetail.

That was quick and easy. We got that one up. Okay. We talked about Kansas. Let's move on. No, but we do cover a lot of information in this particular publication. Anyway, we want to give a little shout out to the Lewises. Oh, Shelby killed an absolute monster bull with her bow, the largest bow killed by a lady ever in the state of Nevada, 401-inch gross giant, and what a good couple. Her and Dallas are awesome. Oh, Dallas, what, two years ago killed a monster bull, and he was on the cover of the October issue. Kind of crazy. That's right. Appreciate them taking the time to document their stories, send the photos in to us, not just from this year, but the last several years of trail cam pics through them and some friends. Awesome bull, congratulations, and that kicks us off. Let's talk about Nevada. Nevada. So Nevada did extend their application deadline, and it's going to be May 4th.

Pretty awesome. Kind of caught a lot of people off guard. We've been getting a lot of anxious people hitting us, because Nevada opened up about a week ago. Start taking applications. Normally do they open up. They tell you 14 days in advance when they're opening up. They remind you every day that they're open. They are doing a great job of telling the customer, come apply here. People are ready to apply. But since it's not due until May 4th, and we're also waiting on some of the other states getting their stuff finalized, it gave us a little bit of breathing room when normally they're due. Let's just say the 18th to 20th of April. It's a lot shorter turnaround. Now we've got two weeks extra, but it is done. Like I said, the eMag online, let's break it down, Carter. People enjoy it, yeah. And so one thing we do have, Bronson, before we get started, we have the guide draw.

We talked about it earlier. In fact, those results will be out this week. Okay. And a little birdie has told me, and you as well, Bronson, the draw takes place today. They're coming out on Wednesday. I don't know. A little tweet. Tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. Okay. Pretty exciting. We're super excited. Draw results. Not for us. In another word. We can't apply for that. Draw results coming out in an otherwise kind of a weird time. There's just a weird vibe out in the world right now where everybody's locked in and everybody's even wondering if we're going to have hunts. Of course, we're going to have hunts. But having said that, something to look forward to. You're going to see a lot of Instagram posts, people excited to get your tags. 300 people, plus or minus, are going to get good news this week about Nevada rifle deer hunts. So good luck.

Let us know if you draw and keep some eye for stories and photos later on. So as far as for changes for Nevada, that was the main thing was the deadline. You know, they're now going to allow you to turn your tag back within seven days of the release of the draw results. And you don't have to actually accept your tag. Take possession of them. Yeah. Turn it back in. So anyway, a couple of those kind of things. They're going to have some draw results. Same kind of thing. They should be available May 22nd. And then they've got a second draw. It's kind of an official second draw. It doesn't use your points for tags that are left. Remaining balance of tags. And then there's a first come, first serve after that. But that is very similar to, say, you know, Colorado, things like that. So anyway, that's about it. We went through. Want to tell everybody thanks for submitting photos.

We got some giant sheep, giant deer, giant elk. We appreciate all that, all the support. And we hopefully showcased them well for you. It's a testament to the quality of a hunt you get in Nevada. When you draw a Nevada tag, for the most part, you've got something. It doesn't matter what species it is. You've got a great tag. They grow great antelope, great elk, great mule deer, great sheep of three species. Non-residents can apply for just the California and desert. But when you get a tag in Nevada, you usually have a really, really good hunt. And so, yeah, it's a testament to them with making what they have, making something great out of what they have. They're the driest state in the nation. And as precipitation goes, so goes the quality of some of their antler, you know, for deer and elk especially. But they were great last year.

And all indications look like this is going to be another one. This is a green light year for Nevada. Epic chia pet year for antler games. So anyway, we're super excited. It's awesome. You know, it's one of those states, like Adam says, we all apply for Nevada. We apply for every species available to us, even antelope. Bronson and I, find it interesting, you jumped in with antelope. That's the first thing on your mind was antelope. That was the first species you listed. That was a random, it was alphabetical. Oh, hey, get it. I think. Got it. That's what I'm sticking with anyway. I'm with you. I don't know if the other ones after antelope were alphabetical, but it just came to my name. You know, and it's kind of interesting. We ran through the antelope drawing odds, super tough to draw, similar to Arizona.

Very tough to draw antelope in the state of Nevada, and they've got a lot of quality going on there, and a lot of units. It's a big state, all of which, most of which, have antelope in them. Yep, they do. If you like to hunt antelope, they're not easy to get. They're not as hard to draw as Arizona, but they are very good quality. Probably the biggest thing to keep in mind is when you consider Nevada. We've already talked about it's a great state from a quality standpoint. It's looking like a great moisture year in Nevada. You've got to first off, bite off something, and that's $155. Yes, very expensive. That's your first really that, you know, there's a lot of people that don't like to pay the, you know, the bigger non-refundable fees, which you'd have to label Nevada is one of the more costly non-refundable. But it's a hunting license. It's $155.

And then if you're going to make that decision, then load up. Load it up afterwards to get what we like to call what?

Go ahead. What? I don't know what we're calling it. Tell me. I was just going to say get the bang for the buck. I was ready for you to say that. Oh, all right. I had another guess. I'm drinking. Whoa. I thought you were going to say plug and play. No. That gets overused at times. Apply, apply, apply. Plug and play. Let's get overused. Come on. This is the reason. I'm drinking a sugar Mountain Dew today, and you're drinking a Monster. We are not on the same wavelength. Monsters are 10 calories. We're not on the same wavelength. That's what I'm saying. That's right. 107. You're 170, bro. Yeah, but I get sugar. And it's half the size. But I get sugar. I've already got my vitamins from the Monster this morning. I'm going to. This is, like I say, I've taken two prenatals with this one because this is the second one. Okay.

But the first thing you really got to decide is do you want to bite off that non-refundable cost? Yes, you do. It's very similar to Arizona. Let me answer it. Yes, you do. And why? Why would you then back that up? Well, the nice thing, like you said, you get to plug and play with all the species. There we go. Sheep, elk, deer, antelope. And, of course, you can do the PIW deer. By the way, Silver State. One tag out there available to residents or non-residents for sheep or elk or deer or antelope. And it's $25 to plug and play. And it's equivalent of their heritage or governor tags. You get to hunt anywhere in the state from either August 1st or September 1st in case of desert sheep through the end of the year. Right. That's right. It's equivalent of their governor tag. Then you have PIW. For deer. For non-residents, the only thing we have available to us, PIW ones. Three of them.

Three tags, I think. Three tags for deer. And that's any open season. So there's an open season. With that weapon, you get to hunt it. Archery's open. Grab your bow. Go hunt. Having said that, of the three, we had two Epic Outdoors members. One of our licensed app clients and another one drew that last year. Ben Puntrock. Yeah. And Bruce Billings. Yeah. And he did a story. Killed breaking 400. He killed a 200-inch, 210-inch type typical with his PIW Nevada. Drew a limited entry Utah. So appreciate that. And sending that in for us. So, hey, somebody's going to win them. It's an extra $10 chance. Then they have more. Tell me more. They do. They have the sheep and then the elk and the deer and the antelope. What else am I missing? Dream. Oh, the dream tags. They do have a raffle for the dream. Now, this is not, and this is why I wasn't thinking about it, Bronson.

Again, you're drinking Mountain Dew. I'm on a monster. But the dream tags are totally separate. It's a raffle type tag. And so, anyway, meaning raffle process, meaning you can buy it. Unlimited chances. Separate application. The other ones we just talked about, the Silver State add-ons for roughly $25 per species. And the $10 add-on for non-resident deer PIW. Right when you're applying for everything else. That's right. The dream is you got clear until the end of June to go buy as many as you feel like you can morally feel good about. June 30th, 1159 Pacific Daylight Time, 2020. You need to go in and have your dream tickets purchased and you can buy in. You can buy in for $5.75 each, sold online only. They draw them in early July. And so, anyway, you can go and do that for multiple species and have at it. So, that's separate than the regular Nevada draw system.

So, anyway, you apply for sheep, apply for elk, deer, antelope, and go from there. Sheep, like you indicated, has California bighorn and desert available to non-residents. Residents only are eligible to apply for some Rockies. We ride it in there. Put a pretty good section in there, considering it's for residents only. And we generally talk about these states from a non-resident perspective. We ride it in there, you know, talked about the different units, 114, 115, 074, 091. Occasionally, it's shared by Utah. This year, it's not available for residents. And there were some pretty subpar quality of animals taken. And it's the way it is. Since the Rubies had their die-off Bronson, and that was arguably one of the best in the nation. You know, very rivaled for the top-end rams. Not the numbers, but the top-end. Unbelievable, right?

And so, now we're dealing with units that are just killing average. A nice Rocky is 150-incher. Mostly 100 to, you know, 145-type inch Rockies. If I was a resident, honestly, of the handful of tags that they're given right now, I would highly consider doing points only without the knowledge of what there's going to be in the future. But right now, it's pretty rough with what's available right now. Pretty rough. And so, anyway, non-residents, we continue to have 23 units to choose from. There's a lot going on there. There's some die-offs happening, 205, 207, you know. Some of these units are definitely units that guys need to be considered. Consider, you know, when they're going to apply. Take those into consideration of what's going on there. For 183, you know, still, you know, struggling numbers-wise, and tag numbers are going to reflect that and probably stay the same.

They're going to have a reduction in tags in 205, 207. So, anyway, a couple things there to be aware of. They're having, oh, signs and indications that that is spreading, and they expect will spread into other units. We'll keep you posted as that changes and develops over the next few years. Yep. For non-residents, well, residents as well, the number of sheep tags that they give in Nevada, specifically desert sheep, is unsurpassed. You know, 306 or 10 or whatever it was total, 30 of which went to non-residents last year. That's a lot of desert sheep tags, considering we're Colorado gives one. Utah gives like four. New Mexico gives, let's say, three to four, you know, something like that. Texas, maybe one. Arizona, up to 10%. Could go rocky or desert, but let's just call that 10 or 11, you know. California, one or two. One or two. I mean. It's up to 10%. That's right. It's one or two.

And, again, now you're on a 75-25 split in California where, you know, 75% go to the people with points, the max points. So, overall, what we're saying, there's a lot of opportunity to get drawn there. Doesn't mean the drawing odds are incredible. They just give more tags. The odds are still very tough in Nevada for desert sheep. Even though they give more tags than anywhere else, doesn't mean the odds are better. You'll look at those. We have all 23 units broke down, how they played out last year and the five years prior. But a couple of things I think they probably should talk about regarding Nevada is the whole, the draw process slightly. It's a little bit unique as they give you five choices to apply. All five of which are valid. Some people like that. Some people have partitioned recently to change that.

We've, I guess, voiced our opinion about that, as have others. And when you look at some of the things like, let's say, desert sheep or some of the other units like that, when you factor in that you can apply for a quarter, 20% of the, everybody can apply for 20% of the units, it's hard to really tease apart drawing odds and things like that. And even when you start talking about trophy stuff when it comes to deer and elk, all right, when you have five choices to play with, what are you going to do with that first one or two choices? You're always going to go for the best couple of units. Go for the gold. You always are. Why would you not? Even in New Mexico, you've got three choices. People always put in. They go for the absolute gold on choice one, sometimes two, and then go with what they're willing to accept on choice three. Let's say you have two choices in Nevada.

And, Chris, I think before we dive into this a little deeper, why don't you read that question you got? I didn't even know you got that question. You just indicated it just as we walked into the room. And I thought, well, maybe it's fitting to throw it on the podcast. Yeah, so I just got a message from a guy that's concerned about that. He says, please stop suggesting a three-choice application in Nevada will make draw odds better. It's going to turn these better units into what Arizona and Utah have with their strip and Henry tags. Okay. Good luck drawing them. By allowing five choices, it lets these hunters that aren't as serious about those units draw the easier units they picked for choices three to five. Now they are back to zero points, and their odds of drawing a top unit again drops dramatically.

This allows the trophy guys to apply for the toughest units in the state year after year. In an era where everyone thinks they are a trophy hunter, the top units will be only harder to draw by limiting choices. Okay. I think there's a couple things there. First off, we never said three choices. We've actually said two. Or one. I mean, if I was a— I'd do one if I could choose. If I could pick. To help the drawing on. But one or two, whatever. We've never suggested three. Now, there was a John's Ends that put forth a petition, and it's stated in there. And it's public. I mean, it's public knowledge. He's fine with everybody seeing it. By the way, that did get tabled for 2020, mainly because of this. The public meetings had to get shut down throughout Nevada for commission meetings and cab meetings. Corona.

So anyway, that caused these meetings to be canceled, so they're not going to talk about it. They're not going to entertain it for this year's job. Nor the point-boosting issue. There was a number of issues coming forward that they're not going to talk about. But with that, I contend, you know, and this is, hey, this is just a guy that makes a living in this industry that's done it for 20-plus years. It feels like, to me, people are going to apply for what they really want. It's going to force Reno guys to, say, Bronson, if you and I were residents and we lived in Reno, I'm not maybe going to pick clear over here in a unit that I don't really know well, 24, 22. But I've heard about 24 forever. Right now. Am I only going to do that? Or am I going to kill a 200-inch around Reno on those late hunts, which, quite frankly, are awesome. That's right. You know what I mean?

And they know they're awesome. They know they're awesome. Well, exactly. And those individuals that want to draw more often, more often than the question referenced, people that want to draw and put the lesser units, quote, lessers, choices three through five. Now that you go to, if you went to one or two, they're not going to put any of the good ones down there at all. Right. They are not going to put them because I have to sacrifice my one and only choice for a 240s rifle. I'm not doing it. Right. I'm going to put in for 06 early, 101 to 109 early. Or 07 late. Or whatever I want. Or whatever. All right. So I think your odds will get better because right now you've got a swath of people putting in for these, a swath, five deep of everybody putting in swath. The overlap is starkly different than it would be if you only had one choice or two.

And frankly, the best trophy units in the state, I'm not going to overanalyze them to the Henry's extent or the strip. But for all intents and purposes, they're as bad as that right now. Well, let's talk about that. With the strip and the Henry's in Utah, we have, let's just call it five areas that will produce a big deer. Okay. And yeah, we're talking 95,000 general tags, about 1,500 limited entry tags. Okay. Now in Nevada, we're talking about 15 or 20 areas that will produce a 200-incher. Yeah. I don't know. 220s, 240s, 130s, 231. I killed one. There's six. Down south. Yeah. In 26. Oh, six, oh, seven, 194, 196. I mean, oh, five, one. Just keep going on and on and on. Oh, five, one's been producing some big deer. And so you start looking at it and you go, no. And then you take three season choices within each of those units. Archery's awesome. Muzzler's awesome. Rifle. Early rifle.

Mid rifle. Late rifle on some of these. And now let's just say they did go to one choice like we said. What are you going to choose? You're going to choose a late 22? If you do late 22, you ain't doing 24? Bronson, you're not going to do 23. You're not going to do 24. You're not going to do 13. All of which might have been on my application. Before. With 22. That's right. So I just don't see the math and what he's talking about. Now, if you do have the Henry's of Nevada and 24 is the only place in Nevada that's going to produce a big deer, then obviously you're going to get 24 getting the majority of the applicants. But 23 produces. Got way too many good options in Nevada, though. To spread people out. That's my point. What we're talking about is eliminating the five choice swath everybody's putting out and you're going to get overlap on that. So I want to make one other point, Bronson.

And this is on our Epic Outdoors website. If members can go in there and look at it, the bonus point breakdown. 24 rifle, 241 to 245 rifle, 40.43% of all non-resident deer rifle applicants applied for it. Almost half of every deer rifle applicant in the state applied for 24 rifle. Applied there. Now, if there was only one choice, let's just say one choice to make it easy. Would it stay that high or better? Let's say it did, though. Let's say it did. It could. What would it do to the rest of the drawing odds? Be incredible. Okay. Everywhere else. Okay. And so, but it's not going to be, it's not going to, you're not going to have that. You know when you eliminate choices two through five, that's going to go down. Yeah. A hundred percent. Right now it's 41%. People of all non-resident rifle applicants have as one of their one to five choices, 240s rifle. Okay.

And you want to pick the next unit. I don't know. Pick another unit. Well, let's just look right here. Let's do a 223, 221, 223 late rifle. 37.7%. 38%. Of all non-resident. Okay. This is all non-resident. All non-resident deer rifle applicants applied for this hunt. Come on. Come on. We're talking over one and three. That can't, that's not going to, that's not going to get worse. I don't, I understand to some extent they think that people getting them out of the point pull quicker because you have more choices out there for them to put three through five when they put easy ones and they get drawn, they go back to zero points. And it means when they put in for the tough units, yeah, they're in for them, but they really don't have a chance. Okay. Kind of see it. Our contention is when you limit it to one or two choices, they're not even going to put down those one or two or three choices.

They're not going to put them down. They're not kidding. It's not worth it because they want to hunt every year. They're going to put down archeries and early rifles and the stuff they want to get every year. Their second or third, fourth, fifth choices. Those are now their first and second choices. And we all do it. We all do it. I look at my application and I go, I would really like this tag. I would really like this tag. And by the way, I, here's three and I almost like those better, but because I can't even buy my way into the top two, you put them, you put them right. Because there's a value out there in the world. There's a value of having a Henry's tag. Now, maybe I know about a giant over here on Pine Valley General. But I'm going to put Henry's because I'm supposed to, the world thinks I'm supposed to.

There are more higher numbers of big deer and there's less hunters in the field. So you kind of do that. But in your mind, you're actually glad you get a hunt. The backyard for three seasons on a dedicated or whatever. I don't know. So anyway, I just think, I think there's some fouled logic there. I totally get it. And this is what happens when we take a stance. We, we do run the risk of somebody, you know, people, lots of people. He said it. There's 400 more that think it. And so we, forces us to say something on a podcast to get it out to the world of why we think that. It's one thing to read on paper. We think that they should change it. You can't explain it like you can verbally. And at times, Bronson, you and I think certain things, but we're non-residents to that state. Run it how you want. Do how you want. You want five choices? Go do it. We'll adapt.

We apply in all the Western states. Frankly, we like the variety. We like, we like the fact that a couple of states, a few don't have point systems here and there. We like the, in the certain states, it's nice to be able to predictably know the Utahs, the Colorados, the Wyomings, maybe to some extent Arizona, to know when you're going to have a portion set aside for the high point holder and you know when you're about there. And then it's nice to just have flat random luck like Nevada. You know, throw your names in the hat, square your points, throw your names in the hat that many times plus one. And if you get lucky, you get lucky. It will adapt. It's not like we're going to quit playing Nevada. We've done it for 20 plus years already. I just, we've seen the stats and analyze them for too long. The overlap that we just got done talking about with the big chunks, the five choice swath.

So I think- And I want to reiterate, we did not initiate this change or we did not petition them for this change. We were asked to weigh in by several different people. County advisory boards, game and fish commissioner just wanted our thoughts and input and that's all we provided. Never, never, never one going to send them a proposal and this is what we think should change the world to make it, make it a better place. But it is nice to have better drawing odds. This will do that in a good portion of the units. Some, some units I guess are just so good and there's such a finite number of tags. Maybe you won't see a huge jump in odds. Maybe you won't. But, but how can it get worse? How can it get worse? Put, put 10 choices on there. I guess that's how it could get worse. That's how it could get worse. So, so anyway, overall sheep in Nevada, we're a huge fan.

Of course, you'll see that Bronson and I spent some time with some clients down there as well as my niece. Yeah. It was awesome. Five, five desert sheep hunts in Nevada last year between the both of us. It was fun. A lot of different units. Kind of a challenging year. It was wet and rainy and spread them out. It was cold and it just kind of was a different hunt overall. Overall size even seemed to come down on average a little bit. But having said that, what a great, great state to hunt sheep in beautiful deserts. Just incredible genetics. And so we cover the units. Like even, you know, Jefferson, the Area 16 populations are doing super good. While there's a few units that are struggling, other things are doing well. And we indicate that in the magazine. The California bighorns, great options there. You know, there was a big old ram taken out of 068.

And that was kind of, from what I understand, didn't talk to the hunter himself, but from what I understand, it was kind of an accident. Where'd he come from? Yeah, exactly. But it is a good unit. And so same with 051. There's like four subherds within there and they move around a lot. And sometimes it's hard to keep track of those big rams. It was a little bit less big shoot. There's a hole on the California bighorn. Pretty hard. There's six units open to non-residents. Really hard to tease apart ranking one through six. Because you're all looking at 150s to mid-160s kind of rams with a few wild card that can pop up almost anywhere. Nothing's bad when it comes to hunting sheep, especially a California bighorn. Count as a Rocky if you need one of those. Apply for them if you're applying for everything else. And forget about it. There's an example right there.

If you want to really look at what it would do. We've only got six choices right there. How many people put in five choices for a California bighorn? Everybody. Everybody. Okay. Now if you just had to pick one, now not 90% of the people are all in for the same units. I mean. That's right. That I understand is a very unique case. In some years we've only been able to put in for four units. It makes sense about anywhere. Honestly. I mean whether you're dealing with 30 units or five units or six units or 10 or 12 units. It just makes sense. One thing I think is worth noting, part of that proposal, and it wasn't again our proposal, but part of it was talking about, and it brought up the interesting point of possibly once in lifetime tags, drawing multiple tags in your life. It's just brought that to light.

While we're changing or potentially looking at change in the number of applicants or number of choices on your application would be changing things possibly to once in lifetime tags. Because they're a state that we know lots of people that have drawn multiple desert sheep tags. That's right. That's a problem. Well, yeah. That's right. If you, and the premise of some of this proposal is it wasn't quote, and I'm going to use the word quote, fair that somebody with maximum points has still not drawn their sheep tag. And, and I guess our response is, is it's just life. When it comes to drawing sheep tags, life's not always fair. Luck happens. They wanted to, this proposal had an input to put 25% of the tags to a high maximum point draw. And then the other 75 go randomly. In the case of sheep, which was the example that was used, you've just got so many people

flooded in there for such a small number of resource that yeah, you take, maybe you take off 10 tags a year to maximum point holders. What would that really do to knock down maybe the first point tier or two, but then once you got rid of them, what's it going to do? You're back into the same problem. You're going to have people die without sheep in their hands. It's going to be, it's going to be just like Colorado trophy elk. It's just that. And they give all their tags, except for some that come out for the hybrid draw, 20% to the max. And you just, that just keeps climbing. Point creep just happens. And the hybrid draw isn't even, that's kind of, it's relevant, but it's still not even the same. Meaning there's certain codes that have them, certain that don't. And basically once non-residents meet their quota, which always happens, we're not in the hybrid draw.

So we never get a hybrid draw tag. So anyway, for all intents and purposes, non-residents in Colorado, again, and I don't know why we're digressing, but non-residents in Colorado, do not draw unless you have the max points. What does that do to a guy that's just jumping in? A kid. That's what I mean. You're never going to have a chance to draw. That chance gets worse. Because my point was, is even if you make 100% of the tags, which in Colorado's case, it's technically 80% on L to the max, you can't keep up with point creep when you have a finite resource. Such limited number of tags is the best bull tags in Colorado. In this case, desert sheep, California bighorn, you can't make enough headway. Even if you gave all the tags to max, you'd never get down through the list at a fast enough rate. You're only drawing 50 sheep tags a year.

I'm going to currently interrupt this Wazoo Awesome podcast with an ad for MOA. How about that? Let's do it. MOA Rifles. We appreciate them and their support. Kind of a relatively new advertiser for us, but we've went up to a shooting school. Bob Beck, super good guy. His team, we got involved with him through Calvin Halliday a bit. Calvin's helped Bob over the years, done a great job selling rifles and whatnot. Of course, we've had good friends, Reed Miller, I've guided him a bit. He's shooting an MOA, killed a monster with me using his MOA rifle. Anyway, one thing leads to another. Pretty soon we're working with Bob Beck, does a great job, produces great rifles. We appreciate him. MOA Rifles.com, 541-526-1820. They've also got a bunch of accessories as well they use for their guns. They have a bipod system, rearrest shooting systems, things like that.

And so, you know, check all that stuff out. In the magazine, you can check out the ads. It's got a two-page spread in the magazine. You can look at some of the interesting pieces of equipment there to help you become a better long-range shooter, besides just the gun and optic. Say I want to buy a ranch, Bronson, who am I going to call? Well, we've known Blaine St. James for a lot of years, 15, 20, I don't know how long it's been. But Blaine's a very— Mostly because he kills deer. Yeah, he's been a very diehard hunter over the years. He's killed a lot of big deer. Being from Colorado, he's in the know. He's done also all over western North America. It's his, you know, times allowed. He's hunted sheep. He's closing in on North America 29. But Blaine St. James, owner of St. James Sporting Properties, specializes in selling trophy hunting and fishing properties, recreational properties.

That is what they do. Call them if you're interested, 877-354-7247. Blaine St. James, St. James Sporting Properties. They're licensed in Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming. If you're buying or if you're looking to sell a piece of recreational hunting property, ranch hunting and recreational property, give Blaine and his crew a call. You know, right now is a good time to be looking, too, Bronson. I mean, things happen. The economy changes. People's situations change. Families change. Things like that happen. And Blaine's going to be in business no matter what. And so it might be a time you pick up a piece of property for a good value. Maybe even name it the Corona property. I don't know. Who knows? Huh? Change. Do a little name change. Maybe. COVID-19. Ranches. I don't know. All right. So here we are. Let's talk about elk in Nevada. Great opportunity.

They killed some giants. Obviously, a cover bull. Phenomenal bull. It feels like elk are back. I don't know, Bronson. And there's a couple of units, I guess, I guess 06s seemed to be down a little bit. And they were killing monsters, especially that muzzle season. But overall, Ely country. That's probably the exception. It's freaking awesome. Yeah. For a lot of years, five to ten years ago, tag numbers increased to the point it felt like, oh, Nevada. Yeah. A lot of good elk hunting. They're top end, meaning the 350 to 380 type bulls, which a lot of people have come to expect or want or whatever, kind of like when you get a Utah tag or something like that. It felt like that was harder. The last four or five years, that feels like it's really come back strong, as we've seen. And you'll see it in our tables.

A lot of units, Jason, have had slight or in some cases drastic tag reductions in the last few years. Yeah. To try to just, I mean, I guess maintain quality. Nevada, as we said earlier, is the driest state in the nation. Their elk habitat is finite. It is not all over. Like Colorado, dang near everywhere. You could grow an elk. Even in the plains, if you let them. A little frolic in the plains. They'll frolic out there. But for all intents and purposes, some states, the whole state, Wyoming, Idaho, a lot of those, you can grow elk in a lot of places. Nevada is not necessarily that way. You've got desert, big open areas of desert, no trees in between. At night, I'm sure they cross the 20, 30 mile valleys. Now they're on this mountain range. There's a lot of areas that come out at night in the desert. But our point is, I guess, Nevada Department of Wildlife really does a great, great way,

a way of managing their elk resource for great quality. You're going to see a lot of these units, and we cover it in the tables, they have an August 16th to 31 archery hunt. That seems odd. It is odd. For all you people. I have a lot of states out there. It is. People that complain about Utah's archery elk hunts being too early. It can get worse. It can. How about that? Yeah, two weeks, the end of August. How about it? They do have a lot of seasons, August 25th, September 16th. And then they kind of let the bulls frolic and play and rut and do so without interruption. And then they'll come back in with some muzzle seasons, October 22nd, November 5th. And then you've got some of the rifle hunts. The regular rifle hunts are generally in November. They'll have an early and a late. There is an early rifle hunt on Table Mountain for non-residents.

You know, pretty tough to draw those just because of the nature of the beast. Rifle rut hunting, that's pretty tough to draw anywhere you go. So anyway, great opportunities there again. Five choices. Mix and match. Do archery. Muzzle. Rifle. Do whatever you want. You got five choices. They'll pull your application and look at all five before they go to the next guy. So anyway, kind of cool. It's probably worth mentioning. Even though we are talking about early dates, even on those dates that go till September 16th is Nevada. Yeah, they do. And part of that reason is they have high bull cow ratios for the most part. And they don't have, most part, and they do not have general season hunts that just crush them, make them pressured and shut up. You know, they aren't. Nevada elk are limited entry. They're limited entry draw.

And so when they start going down that road with high bull cow ratios, they rut earlier there than even neighboring states like Utah. And so don't let the archery dates that go to September 16th think, ah, that's not going to run. They will be good. Apply archery. If you're an archery hunter, apply archery. It's the best hunt there, especially the ones that go to September 16th. Is that what you're getting at, bro? That's what I'm getting at. A lot of people, you look at that in other states and we're thinking, I don't even want that tag. You know, maybe New Mexico in the wrong year. They don't get going strong. That's not the case in Nevada, I guess, is what we're saying. Our experience is you get that first week in September, they're usually starting to go pretty strong. They are. So anyway, let's move on to Mule Dirt. We're a little wordy today. I don't know what it is.

We're excitable. Huh? We had the weekend. We were cooped up. Cooped up. Even went over there and drove around just trying to decide where to apply. Just drove around aimlessly seeing what stuff looked like. Huh? Maybe you knew you knew. I'm out driving around on Saturday and I call Carter and he's 400 miles away driving some of the opposite direction. I was trying to get to California. I dang near. Well, I did. You hit the border and you were met stone cold. You had to turn back. You did. Well, you're supposed to not go anywhere and that's pretty hard to do. So at the pump, I'm grabbing like the great big paper towels, right? And holding the nozzle. People are thinking I'm a weirdo and I'm feeling a little weird, you know? And then you've got to wash your hands after you get done and try not to go eat anywhere and eat out of a cooler, which we're kind of used to.

But anyway, the more this stuff spreads, the less I guess we're supposed to be getting out and about. So I don't know. But had to go look at a few things before we apply. But anyway, jumping into Mule Deer. Nevada had a great year last year. It was kind of tough in a few of these units. There was a lot of water. And it spread the deer out. And people weren't getting them on trail cameras. When you don't get them on trail cameras, you don't really or you don't glass them up because they're in the thick trees because there's feed everywhere. Tied nuts later on. You don't have the faith that they're there. You just don't have the faith they're there. And they are there. And they lived. A lot of them lived. And so while there was a lot of them killed, and you'll see it in publication, there was a lot of big deer killed. There's a lot of big deer alive. Yeah. There are.

And moisture precipitation goes a long way in Nevada. And just can't, for a lot of people that live in the eastern U.S. or other parts of the United States, let's say the Pacific Northwest, they don't really know really what we're talking about. But you just can't even imagine how big of a difference it makes when you have a widespread winter spring moisture repeatedly that you're approaching 100% plus precipitation. And what that can do to grow on, you know, having the animals healthy, which in turn allows them to have more to push into antlers because they're first going to maintain their body. Their body mass, they're going to recover from winter, which rarely in southern Nevada especially is that ever going to be a real issue. But when they are in good condition that way, they can start growing and they have the feed to have extra, quote extra, because antlers are extra.

Antlers are extra over body maintenance. So you've got to have the extra to grow big antlers. That's right. They're going to preserve the health of their body, and it's all their antlers indicate or indicative of the health of their body. And so anyway, it's going to be awesome. One thing that's kind of what we tease about, there's so much rain. And like, say, Arizona. And we're out there. I'm dang near getting stuck. I didn't tell you, but I was in Arizona, too. Spent a little time. My kid's been down there shed hunting off the kayak and whatnot. So anyway, went and spent a little time with him. And dude, I'm telling you, you can't hardly drive around out there. Sloppy. Sloppy. And I mean, these bulls are going to be knee deep in mud. And maybe that inhibits antler growth because they can't walk fast enough to the next grass. I don't know, Bronson. And it's so muddy. So muddy.

It's hard to even fathom. It can't be a bad thing. It's going to be all right. So anyway, mule deer, great opportunity. Archery hunts, generally speaking. August 10th in Nevada, archery deer. August 10th, September 9th. The muzzle, September 10th. To October 4th. And the rifle, October 5th and 31st. Generally, just saying broad overview. Some seasons in the rifle are broke up. There's some late muzzles like in 08, say Reno country, late archeries. All of these kind of things. There's a few nuances or whatever. Just different things that happen. Rifle rut down there. That desert country and a lot of that country were giving a guy a leg up to at least stand a chance of killing a buck when there's very, very low densities in the middle of nowhere. But generally speaking, that's the basic season structure. Most places have at least two rifle. Not all.

But some of them only have one long season. November 5th to 30, October, or sorry, October 5th to 31. Or in some cases, the 5th to the 5th. October 5th to November 5th. But a lot of other places, they'll do an early hunt. The 5th to about the 20, 21st. Somewhere right in there. And then they'll kick off with a late hunt with very low tag numbers. Hunt that last 10 days or 9 or 10 days of October. Maybe a few days into November when the bucks are starting to rut. So between the rifle hunts, the muzzleloader, and archery, you've got a lot of options to spread around. Think about, again, you've got the 5 choices like we already beat to death earlier. So should be a great mule deer year in Nevada. If you can do, force the hand somehow, which you can't. You can't forcibly draw Nevada. You just get lucky. But maybe be a little bit more aggressive in a year like this.

Whatever that means to you in your personal situation. Whether that means relaxing, not as many late hunts. And if you're a rifle hunter doing maybe more early hunts. Or if you're hunting with all weapons, look at the other weapons. Something to try to give you a little bit of an edge because this should be a great year to have a tag. Make sure you get drawn. That's all we have to say. North, south, east, or west. Get her done. The one thing, though, and let's talk about that, maybe northwest. Oh, in that 033 Sheldon country. You know, that's got its unique set of circumstances up there. They're dealing with wild horses. They're dealing with burns that are just like a cue ball up there. There's just a lot of predation. A lot of issues dealing with, you know, keeping those deer from coming back, so to speak. And where they were in, like, let's say year 2000. And prior, in the 90s.

But anyway, but for the most part, lots and lots of units out there that will produce big bucks this year. So have at it. Antelope, you know, again, my kid drew. I didn't put a picture in this particular magazine. Come out with it a little bit later. But anyway, he killed a great buck. And one of these units, I mean, I said, Sean, you don't realize the odds you beat. I can't believe it, you know. And he's been pretty lucky. Drew an Arizona elk tag this year on a random draw. This kid's freaking lucky. And he's a hardcore hunter. So I'm kind of excited for him. It's going to be a great year. He's filling up your schedule without you drawing jack squat. Well, I'm already altering everything. Everything. Altering Jana's schedule. Amending. Plugging and playing. Pulling out. New Mexico. Things like that. By the way. By the way, Bronson. What? In light of Corona, COVID, whatever.

You can pull your New Mexico apps if you want to. So they charge you up front. They don't have a hard set deadline. Usually it's, you know, kind of arbitrary. Let's stop it. We're getting ready to run the draw. But you can go on there and pull your application. So you want to do it. It's too late to reapply, obviously. But if your plans have changed, you need to do something. Get on to New Mexico. Pull it out. Withdraw it. Things like that. Well, anyway. So, again, after Nevada, we cover a bunch of stories. It's awesome.

Even ran into this Double D story. It was a buck, kind of that we all like. Back in 2016 and 2011, 2016, those were years that we will never forget. Could do no wrong. We will never forget them. There was more 200 inches. I mean, I want to say 20 plus 200 inches on Chocan in two units, right? And so, anyway, Double D, he was a Nevada deer in 24, 240. When people talk 24, it's 241, 245. He was alive and well, the biggest we had seen him. 2015, he grew to 2016. 2016, he was off the charts. Still looked young to me. 2017, started to turn into crap. 2018, we didn't get him. He kind of went MIA for a minute. 2019, they smoke him. So, anyway, and he looks staggish and just old. Just old, I think that's. Yeah, old, old deer. Yeah, in crappy country, so to speak. You know, just desert, crazy country. So, Mojave Greens live there. So, anyway, you got to watch yourself.

They live in a lot of parts of Nevada. Yeah, down there. Remember, Chris? Mesquite stuff. Remember Beaumont in 2012? Oh, yeah. You and I woke one up. Come on. He didn't even flinch. The thing was. I about stepped on it. Coiled up. Was it a Mojave Green? Oh, yeah. 241. No way. Chris videoed it. Remember? The very bottom end of 241. Yeah. It's got him. If you look on the map, I mean, it's got him. And then if you take a picture and come back and Google him, it gives you the guy the heebie-jeebies. Anyway. It does. Well, let's end that. On that note, let's leave Nevada altogether. Let's leave it. Good grief. All right. One thing about Nevada. What's so exciting about Nevada, Brownsville. Carter, come on. Come on. Let go with the Silver State. I just want to tell you, I freaking love Nevada. You're out there by yourself no matter where you go. No matter where you go. Except for Vegas, right?

Okay. But right now, you'd be by yourself down there, too, because it's a ghost town. But anyway, you're by yourself. You've got a quality tag. Almost everything's managed tight, so you're not dealing with just tons and tons of pressure. Long seasons. And I want to say, we look back at those days. There was times where they were hunting Thanksgiving in 241 to 245. Thanksgiving. Rifle hunts. And then we'd look at it. Oh, I wish I could hunt back then. Well, people are going to look at us now and go, man, I wish I could have hunt October 5th to October 31st. You know what I mean? Because nothing stays the same. They're going to shorten that season at some point. And I'm just saying, pretty awesome. There's long season dates, whether it's archery, muzzle rifle.

So, man, if you made it kind of your hunt of the year, you'd have an incredible opportunity to go out there and be by yourself for lots and lots of days and hunt big deer. So, I love it. All right. All right. All right. I'm done. Fly in Nevada by May 4th or points only until May 11th. Don't miss it. Okay. What's next? Do it. Okay. What's next? I don't know. Should we jump into Montana real quick? I feel like we erred. Ow. Well, I knew we were going to do that. We were going to do that because that's why we started with Nevada first. Because it probably has the most excitement. Montana. Sheep, goat, moose, bison. We're talking very tough to draw. Of course, you're excited about moose. No, I'm not, Carter. Huh? I'm not. I have. No. Don't know why you thought that. Well, you've got max moose points. Okay. That doesn't mean I'm excited. Does not mean I killed a goat.

And you are still applying for goats. Probably not anymore. Oh. Wow. Got something against Montana goats. Killing two. No. No. I just remember I'm going to hunt this year. I drew a tag in Alaska. And I'm like, okay. Oh, yeah. I'll probably never kill. I haven't even killed. I haven't even been on the hunt yet. So, I shouldn't count chickens. Maybe you won't even be able to go, Bronson. I know. That's what I mean. I might get COVID. Just relax. But I'm vacillating back and forth on what to do with Montana goat. Because at night. How about Alaska? Okay. I'm going to divert from Montana to Alaska. How about the bears this spring? Going to be frolicking with residents only. Huh? Yeah. They're going to get a free pass. There's going to be a fair amount of people that aren't either through financial difficulties, which is understandable, or just not wanting to travel. Travel restrictions.

And just being able to. What about Canada? What about all the free passes? Game. There's going to be just a surge of an older age class of critter in certain areas where people cannot physically get to. Huh? Yeah. Tell me I'm wrong. No, I don't think you're wrong. Hopefully this stuff shakes itself out, relaxes, runs its course, whatever the right word is for that. Here within the next month or two to where we're then tapering back off like we're seeing in some of the other parts of the world that contracted this sooner. But anyway. Let's get back to Montana. Let's go back to the lower 48. Let's talk about Big Sky. Because Hawaii, I'm not going to Hawaii either. Bronson, think about it. I was going to go up there and hunt. I know you were. With my family. What state haven't we talked about today on the podcast? Let's just rattle them off right now just so we cover all 50.

We were going to go up there and frolic on the beach and go hunt. Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia. All right? Just saying. New Jersey, Delaware, Vermont, New Hampshire. I mean, where are we going? There's access bucks that are going to continue to live because we're not going. And not just you. Not just you. Everybody else, too. That's right. That's right. I know it. Anyway. Montana applications for sheep, moose, goat, and bison are due on May 1st. Data with paper applications, that's a new change. You cannot take. Whoa, whoa, whoa. It's not a big problem. It's not a big problem. Everybody's been applying online anyway. We see this when they start doing online and making paper go away. Pretty soon the state realizes we're only getting 10% of applications on paper, but it holds our draw up by a month because they've got to wait for them to come in.

Then they've got to either scan them and double check them and entry. My penmanship alone would cause them to wait. That's right. You're right. So they call in Greek translators for years. But anyway, yeah. So now they're going to be able to get these draws out in 10 to 15 days. It's going to be awesome. Okay. We already talked about the deer and elk. The deadline is April 1st. That's still coming up, but we covered that in the March magazine. They're going to have those results out by the middle part of April still. And people can apply for deer and elk and do sheep, goat, and moose all together. Do it now if you want to jump in. It has not been available like that before. It's all open. It's all open right now. That's right. When it comes to sheep, moose, and goat. Apply, apply, apply. From a non-resident perspective, they have a list of units that are open for non-residents.

Changes year to year. Changes year to year. There are a few units. Most notably, some of those sheep units that have high tag numbers, goat units that have higher tag numbers. They're almost always open to non-residents. Then they rotate probably 75% of the rest of the units just to spread the love, spread the opportunity. But also, I think it's probably somewhat resident related. So non-residents hurt drawing odds to those rogue units as they randomly come up. We all of a sudden crush it with 500 applicants that year. All right. Next year, they're gone. And the residents have it back to themselves. Let's go back to Nevada. I would like to see some of those sheep units rotate around a little bit. I like that about Montana. They rotate around. Now we always get to hunt the brakes. How cool is that? Yeah. You always can do that if you want. That's right. So anyway.

But anyway, that's the biggest new change is just that. The draw results are going to be out quick. They're anticipating by May 11th. Keep in mind, due May 1st, results are out May 11th for the moose, sheep, goat, bison. Going to be awesome. Going to be able to flip those around quick. There's a few of those guys that are lucky enough to draw. What a great tag you have, although there's just a very few. 10%. Non-residents get 10% of a region's quota. That's right. No more than 10% in a particular unit. Yep. And so, you know, you're kind of limited to a degree. One choice. One choice on the application for rams. Second choice is ewes. Ewes do take. Ewes don't count. Word of slam. But ewes do take away from the non-resident quota and region. Huh? They do. They do and can. I'm not going to tell anybody else what to do, obviously.

There's people that have killed rams and want to kill a ewe just for the opportunity to hunt another sheep or maybe mount it along with their ram. That's cool and it's awesome. But it does come out of the non-resident quota up to 10% of a region-wide quota. A couple of precursors. When you go to apply, you'll have to add the base hunting license for non-resident's $15. Conservation license for $10. Those are buy-ins. Let's just call out the fleecing. All right. And then you're dealing with an application fee of sheep, moose, goat, and bison of $50 each. And if you're applying and you want to do a bonus point, there's another $20. There's a bunch of add-on fees. In general, it'll end up being, you know, $70 to—if you do one species, they're going to end up being about $100 because you've got to buy the $25 basin conservation licenses plus your bonus point fee plus your application fee.

Pretty pricey, Bronzer. You know, it's roughly $100 for the second— We're going to compare to Nevada. Yeah. For the second and third one, it'll end up being, you know, $75, $85. You don't have to pay the point fee. You can elect to just jump in the draw, but they are a squared point system. Yeah. You want to run the math on that? No. One name in the hat versus— Ten names in the hat. Let's just do simple math because it's all I'm capable of today. And that's a guy with three bonus points. He's got ten names in the hat. Three times three is nine plus one for the application. What about the guys with ten or 15 or 19 points? Let's just stick with ten because I can do that one. Okay, 100. 100 names in the hat. Plus one. 101. Yep. Versus my kids, one. Okay. So anyway, you guys can see the value there. Although it's hard to see the value. I'm one of those guys with 19. And so, you know—

You just apply and forget about it. They've fleeced me for 19 years. Back when we were newlyweds, probably about cost me my marriage, you know? So I'm—Jana deserves that I draw a sheep tag because she's been through some things. You know what I mean? She's paid the dues along with you. That's right. That's right. Okay. All right. We covered bison. Bison. No points for bison. No points situation for them. They migrate out that north and that west corner of Yellowstone National Park with weather. Long three-month seasons there. Totally random draw. Odds are not incredible. But it's one of the unique places you can hunt a free-ranging bison. Wild, free, no fences. Kill a bison. The best meat on planet Earth. How about that? It's pretty good. It's not—it's good, but it's not like moose. So anyway, definitely a place you should be doing it. You want to talk about antelope real quick?

Well, we just threw it in. Good grief. We threw it in. I knew you wanted to. Go ahead. Go ahead, Bronson. Hey, we got to talk about it sometime. We're going to talk about it right now because it's in this magazine. So antelope's a little bit unique. They do allow you to apply until June 1st for them with the results out by mid-June this year. It's going to be out quicker again. Montana, as a general rule, is more known for an opportunity antelope state. Tags are pretty cheap. $205 for non-residents. That's cheap. I can't think of a cheaper—in fact, I think we played this and Devon got the answer. We did. We did. But the gas to get from here to there with a headwind. That's all I'm saying. Now let's move on.

Let's talk about Kansas. Apply for Montana. We are advocates of planning in Montana. Kansas, what a great state, huh? Okay. The one thing that bugs me about Kansas— I would love to hunt the mule deer there, but it bugs me. You got to apply for the white tail tag. How much are you going to pay for that, by the way? Paint that picture. You're going to pay $442.50, okay? Plus the other fleecing that comes with it. And so you've got this white tail tag, and you can apply for the mule deer stamp that runs about a 15% to 20% draw, roughly. 10% to 20% type draw. For the stamp, there's no points associated with the stamp. There are points associated with the deer tag, which is a white tail tag, until you use a stamp or get a stamp. And so at the end of the day, you're applying for a mule deer stamp. Let's just say you have 20% draw odds.

And you jump in for a white tail tag, and you've got this $440-some-odd tag that's non-refundable for what? For a white tail. And if you want to go white tail hunting, apply. You should apply. It's got great white tails in it. We've got great outfitters with great white tails. All is well there. It's just kind of bothersome. You know, non-residents can either hunt mule deer with a bow or a muzzle or not even a rifle. They don't have points associated with the stamp. There's no way to really just apply for mule deer only. And so, you know, I've killed a white tail there. We've hunted there. Chris, you've hunted there. You did the walk-in areas, all of that. All is well. If you're a white tail hunter, go do it. If you're a mule deer hunter, not so much worth it. It's just tough. It's tough nowadays. Funds are going to be tighter this year. It's tough for a lot of people.

The other part of that is it's not 97% public land. It's 97% private land. Good point. Are you going on record saying that? Is it really 97% or is it 95%? I'm using loose terms that just came to my head. Don't quote me. I don't want the state assessor and auditor calling me saying it's actually 95.268. Or a guy that draws a tag saying, you said it's right here. But really what we're trying to paint the picture of is you just don't draw a tag and go hunt public land in Kansas. There are public land walk-in areas. Plenty of other people have done well on those too. They're not huge. They're not all over the place. And they don't always stay consistent from year to year to year before they get discovered or they changed hands or whatever else. Or changed management styles, whatever.

Bottom line, you most often are going to have to pay for access on private land or use an outfitter that has access to get privately managed private land. You know, their application period is like the smallest of any state I can think of. So April 1st to the 24th. That's awesome. Okay. Get it in. One species, Carter. What else do you need? They could do it for four days. There's two species. There are mule deer and white-toes. Oh, okay. Deer. But deer. And then you've got the non-resident. We didn't even talk about the hunting license fee of $97.50 on top of $442. Just saying. They could open that for a three-day weekend if they needed to. Three-day weekend. Get in and be done. That's right. All I'm saying is I'm just saying. So anyway, we do have outfitters. You know what I do like about Kansas is you can tell the year you're going to get drawn.

With one point, you're guaranteed to draw pretty much. With no points, you're pretty much going to go. Keep that in mind. And, you know, great drawing odds. And so you can go. You can go. You can plan on going. You can go. You can book it. You can send a deposit to the outfitter. But, you know, don't plan on getting leftover tags anymore. That's a little bit tougher. That's right. It is. And we have all units for both white-till and the mule deer stamp. All the drawing odds are in the magazine as well as on our website. Didn't mention that about Montana as well. We cover a breakdown of every single unit in Montana. Sheep, moose, goat. Every unit open to non-residents. A brief description. Five years of harvest statistics. Drawing odds. All that type of stuff. It's in the magazine. That's what we produce every month this time of year. Same thing with Nevada.

And if there's a unit in there that we didn't cover in the case, maybe you're a resident of Montana and wanted to know what unit X or Y was, that's what our online member services are for. Have an online hunt planner as well as the online drawing odds for all western states, all species, all units to be able to. You got a specific unit that we didn't cover? Look it up. Go check it out on our Epic Outdoors website. You do have to be a member of Epic Outdoors to be able to log in and see that. That's not something free for the world. So join Epic Outdoors by giving us a call or jumping on the website and epicoutdoors.com and sign it up. $100 a year. You can only put so much on paper. I think that's what we're getting at. You can go online, Epic Outdoors, and check out everything as far as in relation to drawing odds. But you can only put so much on paper.

So sometimes we have to be selective. Sometimes we get to do all non-resident units. It just depends on the state. But we try to satisfy everybody. It's kind of tough. Yep. One more shout out to another sponsor for us today is the guys over at PhoneScope. Digiscoping. Accessories there for your phone. Capture that. It's obviously taken the world by storm, so to speak. Everybody's got to live with it. If you live out west and you're glassing a bunch, whether you're just a hunter for yourself, whether you're an outfitter guide, whatever, PhoneScope's got something for you. Everybody's using a tool like this in there. PhoneScope can be found at P-H-O-N-E-S-K-O-P-E.com. If you do want to call them, it's 800-790-4480. If you're not sure, you don't have a retailer, somebody right near you that's selling them, check them out online there or give them a call.

Let them know what your phone is, your optic is. They'll be able to make it fit. Awesome product to be able to digiscope through your binoculars, spotting scope, or whatever it is you've got to need for. A little shout-out. You said that was the last one. I'm going to do one last one. Exhibit A, StealthCam.com. StealthCam.com. Okay? Here we go. That's right. What are we giving away? Okay. Yeah. I thought that's where you're going. We need to give away a StealthCam. I thought that's where you're going. I'm headed there. I'm headed there. Sorry. Okay. But anything you need StealthCam-wise, I mean, you never know what the availability on some of this product is going to be, Bronson. People are not able to ship some product out there. Well, some of these companies, and it's partly why we did what we did on some of our orders,

I guess we'd call it on the aggressive side, is some of these companies, as we know, as a lot of companies around the U.S., the workforce is not able to just walk in their factory and go to the work. That's right. All right. They're not. And so when that happens, stuff gets shut down. You're seeing it with fish and game agencies. People don't want to touch boxes. Yeah. They don't want to touch gas pumps. And so if you want to give us a call. All right. Sounds good. So anyway, StealthCam. Chris, if we don't have it in stock, we'll order it for you. Whatever it is you want, get online. StealthCam.com. Tell us what you want, and we'll get it in for you. Let's give one away. Go for it, Chris. All right. We're giving away a brand new trail camera. And the way to enter, this is going to be an Instagram giveaway.

So what we're going to do is, as you listen to this podcast at any point, take a screenshot on your phone. If you don't have it on your phone or you don't know how to screenshot, just take a picture of yourself listening to the podcast or take a picture of the screen you're listening on and post that to either your story or to a regular post. Make sure and tag us. And so we're going to go through all those tags. You do. Yep. And then we do a random generation. Number generator. And get a winner. Right. And we will draw that after the deadline. The deadline is going to be Friday, March 27th at 1159 p.m. Mountain Standard Time. Throw in a think-proof box with it, too. What do they got to tag, Chris? Anything they got a keyword tag to be able to find them? What you're going to do is you're going to tag at epic underscore hunts. And that is our Instagram account. Make sure and tag us there.

You can also do hashtag epic outdoors. Right on. Well, we appreciate you all listening. As you can tell, we're kind of excited here at the office. I know it's a bummer out there. There's a lot of people locked in their houses. We're going to be locked into our house before long. It feels like who knows. Be careful out there. Take it for real. It looks like it's pretty legit. Did you know this thing, Bronson, supposedly came from a bat? Yeah. A bat on a carcass hanging in a meat locker somewhere on some market, I think. Jumped from animal to animal to person. I've read about it. Don't they eat bats, too, these people? Yeah. It's gross, dude. And these bats, they carry HIV, too. Like, bats are freaking gross. You're not supposed to eat bats, aren't you? Come on. I don't know how we get on that subject, but the answer is no. You're not supposed to eat them. No. They're gross. It's...

So, anyway, a heck of a fight on our hands. Yeah. And hopefully, like I said, we hope we can grit our teeth, get through this next several weeks, hopefully, and see things start to mellow out a little bit, the curve to flatten. Read that term on the internet, too. Yeah. You know, people, one thing... One thing, we're getting asked a ton, Bronson. Is the drawing odds going to be off the charts? You know what? I think everybody thinks the drawing odds are going to be off the charts, and everybody's holding tight with their app strategy. Am I wrong? Tell me I'm wrong. No, I think it's a little bit different if it was... I mean, as tough as this is hitting our states and nation right now, it's... I think the consensus is it will be a shorter-lived problem. That doesn't also mean that once you hit the word go, that the economy's cranking again, because it doesn't react that way.

But if you can, to some extent, weather the storm within your business life, employment life, or whatever that makes your time away from home come fall be able to still happen, I think it'll be all right. So I think, for now, that's the saving grace, is it feels more like a shorter-term thing. This is not going to be a three-year-long plague or something like that, like when the downward and a full-blown market recession that we had in 2008. Before we're going to war, and now the oil is in play over there like it has been sometimes, and it's really been a much longer effect. So hopefully that's the case. I know, I guess in general terms today, that could change in a month from now, because we talked to dozens and dozens and hundreds of hunters a month to assess what they're doing in terms of applying.

And overall, I think there's a general feeling that more people are starting to feel a bit more reserved and switching to maybe points-only strategy. That's their mentality. I don't see that being widespread yet, though, rampant. I would say that. No, and in fact, New Mexico had like thousands. 10,000, I thought it was. 10,000 more. Yeah. You know. 10,000 more applications submitted. Now, you know, of course, that came on. The COVID-19 came on right at the end. Let's call it the last week and a half of their application schedule and deadline. And so anyway, maybe it's not true representative of how people feel, but there's plenty of confidence out there. People are still applying. So, and we believe you should too. Gain points. You can't get time back. Gain points. Meaning, if you go a year without points, you know, nobody's happy about it.

Nobody's ever said, man, I'm glad I didn't apply 10 years ago. Nobody ever says that. They always say, man, I wish I would have applied 10 years ago. I wish I wouldn't have missed that one point. Had a guy today. I had maximum deer points in Wyoming. I don't know why or how, but now I'm one behind. I do not know why. How that happened. That one point is making the difference. Making or breaking his opportunity. That's right. So, all right, guys, be healthy out there. Don't touch too many gas pumps. You know what I mean? At least bare hands. Put on some gloves and gas up your truck and be happy. Huh, Bronson? This will pass. It's going to pass. We're going to go hunting this year. That's right. So, all right, everybody. We appreciate all the support out there. Get online. Check out our April magazine. It's at the printer. And apply. It's time.

If you need the mag, if it's overdue, you've listened to us long enough, give us a call. 435-263-0777. 435-263-0777.