EP 291: Wyatt's 2023 Limited-entry Archery Mule Deer Success Story

Anything to do with Western big game.

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Hey everybody, Jason Carter, Adam Bronson, and Wyatt. I'm here. We got him. And John, and Logan, of course, but Wyatt. Wyatt is the man of the hour, the man of the month, man of the year. The man of mystery is no longer going to be mysterious. That's right. I'm kind of bummed. The last couple podcasts, I've had guys call me out on for being out scouting too much, maybe. Yeah. Have you? People are not used to you leaving the office. Missed that whole Q&A. When you've got a deer hunt pending and it's an August opener, it's like you're scouting heavy in July. And Bronson, I think you called it. Remember, you said, who was the first in the office to smash? I think I got. I think you nailed it. Wyatt frowned upon that statement, though. Well, he doesn't want you to unleash too many facts too early. Yeah.

He didn't want people to know he was going to get a hunting this year or anything, let alone what tag he had. I don't blame him. If he was doing a moose hunt in Quebec or caribou or whatever. A 200-inch plus moose is a pretty big bull. I mean, you never know. I don't think it was that as much as there was a few other guys in the office that had some really good deer tags that started before me. We don't have confidence in ourselves, Wyatt.

We've done this rodeo. Going for the odds. Strictly an odds. Well, let's see. Bronson, I win. What do you want? Did I? I don't know. Hey, how about the Diamondback 2000? War Tex 2000 we just sold. Two weeks off paid. Paid administratively. Two weeks. I'm leaving tonight. John, we're going to have to vote.

Two out of three. It's on the calendar. I vote no. If it matters, it's on the calendar. I would rather do the Diamondback 2000 rangefinder.

That we just sold. Let him pick something out of the optics room. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I don't know. Anything for that matter. I like it. I like it. All right. Let's see. I want time off. Well, we've got some new apparel on our store. Okay. On our merch store. I was wondering. I was going to bet you, Adam, how long it would take John. To bring that up? To bring that up. And I think I won. You couldn't even mark the place to bet. I couldn't even get to discussing it. Go ahead, John. Take it away. I'm so excited about it. Go ahead. Oh, it's been years since we had new merch. So we're coming out with a whole bunch. I hate the word merch. Why? What do you want to call it? I don't know why. What do you want to call it? It feels like a flatty term. Merchandise is too long. Swag. How long has it been called merch? Clothing? Like 16 months? 20 years? No, it hasn't. Oh, it hasn't. It's a new term.

Merch has been around for a while, I think. No, it's been a long, long time. It seems like it's a new term. It does. It's a new term to you. It's a flatty term. That's right. New term to you. It's a Gen Z. Merchandise has been out forever. It's a low, low, 20, 30 years old to the rest of the world. I've been calling it apparel to appease Jason. I didn't want to make it too Gen Z. I'll bet if you look up merch in Wikipedia, it was born in 2019. There's like a thing on Google that calculates when a word was first invented and its usage over time. That's what I mean. When did it spike? You got it? No. Okay, I'll do it. Merchandise was around in the 50s. I know that. Merchandise has been forever, and I like it. I like the word. But this merch is kind of like I'm too lazy to say merchandise, and I'm just going to throw out a little merch on our website. That's right.

Merchandise was born back when mercantiles were around. We should Google it. I'm trying to Google it. But anyway, John, go ahead. Anyway, the problem is you can't just say apparel because we've got some other things on there. Yeah, like some goods. Some other goods, yeah. What do we got on there? Accessories. When? According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, 1982 was the first merch usage. Who said 30 years? But listen. That's like 50 years. That's when the word was invented. Oh, 50 years. But when did it pick up mainstream? There's a difference. Well, back in 1982 when it was – you'd have to look at the paperback. Merriam-Webster. Freaking Merriam-Webster Dictionary to see it. And nobody did that. Yeah. Now some flatty guy just says, hey, March. And everybody says, oh, that's a cool term. Oh, yeah. It is a new word to Jason. And Jason Merriam-Webster Dictionary. And Adam. It's 2022.

I've never said the word in my life. Maybe. Until today. Never said it. Now I'm afraid we're going to use it nonstop like we use the word tang, and I hate the word tang. It's a good breakfast drink. I love tang. I do love tang. I miss tang. I love hot tang. So if you go to our website, right on the top it says merch. I think you can feed hummingbirds with tang. It's sugar water. Oh. Their beats per minute would go up by about 20%. Then you throw a little white monster in there. Oh. They might blow up mid-flight. We've got hummingbirds. That's like wildlife abuse or something, isn't it? No. Just a drop. You're not force feeding them. They're coming with their own free will. They're going to have vitamins they've never had. Does one of your kids have a science experiment for science? That would be incredible. Kool-Aid? Tang? What if all the birds died? White monster half tang.

What if all the birds died within five minutes? Would you quit drinking it? No, because you can't extrapolate a two-ounce organism or three, whatever a hummingbird weighs, with a 200-pound dude. You can't. No. You'd have to. Can't extrapolate. You'd have to bring in the pigs, test them on real pigs. Oh. All right. Okay. Let's talk about our merch. You go to our website. Right at the top in the middle. It says merch. It says merch. Does it? Yep. So go click on merch before Jason makes us change it. Well.

Anyway. So there'll be some new stuff coming. Right now there's some awesome t-shirts. Muley's Matter t-shirts are out there. Epic Outdoors t-shirts. Whose idea was that? That kind of was kind of. Hats, mugs, blankies. Blankies, mugs. Yeah. I saw the blanket on there. My wife saw that. She thought it was. She wanted one. Pretty soon we're going to have swimming suits on. Kind of like what? Kind of like what? I'm picking out my Mother's Day presents right now. Yeah. Already. For next May. When's it going to be? Swimming suits? No. An epic blankie. Oh, a blankie.

Geez. What else you got, John? Oh. There's a lot of stuff. Yeah. A lot of stuff. Check it out. And then we'll be adding more too. And we'll be adding more. So follow us on social media. We'll kind of announce when those. Follow for follow. Yep. Follow for follow. Yep. So. All right. Kind of fun, actually. So anyway. A lot on there. A little bit longer delivery times. Maybe just be patient. Five, seven days. Something like that. Yep. All right. Okay. Let's move along. Bronson, should we talk about the point deadlines real quick? Might as well run through it. Just so we don't forget. We're about 30 days almost out for one of them coming up. Which you've done them. I haven't. Oh, yeah. I did them like June or July 5th. How many of your family members did you do Montana points for? Two.

I'm in that boat of trying to decide what's important. I only did elk. I'm just. The deer. What's your thought process? And don't give. There's not very many places to spread out. I mean, some years and even like unit 270, we can draw what? Four or five non-rescent tags up to. There's not even non-rescent drawn. I mean. And so I just. Elk though. Within five years, an archery elk tag somewhere, you can get it. So to me, that's why I did it. That's where the value is. And it gives you options. Archery elk. Rifle elk is tougher. But anyway. So the bonus point, not to be confused with the general season combo preference point. You can do them both right now. But the bonus point deadline for deer, elk, antelope, sheep, moose, goat is September 30th. Yeah. And then the preference point would be December 31st. Yeah. I don't know why they made it six months long. But they did.

They just probably gave them another few hundred bucks. Yeah. That's $100 a piece. A few hundred thousand. But just a reminder, if you read the magazine and you remember, you probably heard us say it over and over. Don't buy that $100 preference point if you don't intend to apply for the general next March, April. Because it's going to be like lighting a $100 bill on fire. Because you can't do points year after year after year. You have to. You can do points the first year. Then you have to apply for a license or your points go to zero. So if you buy it right now and don't apply, it's $100. Hey, just send me $100. I'll take it. So if you want to donate it to Mealy's Mountain. Yeah. So if you want to go next year is the key, then you want the point this year. If you don't want to go next year, don't get the point. Just do the bonus. That's right. That's right. So that's Montana.

What's next? And just do the bonus. Yeah. And then we've got Wyoming. We got October 31st for Wyoming points. Yeah. And even if you applied, you've got to get points. Especially for deer, elk, and antelope. Yep. You do. It's kind of a crazy thing. And I guess. You apply and you're unsuccessful. It's been, what, the second or third year now? And so here's the question of the year. Sure. When do you want to do the moose and sheep? Or when do you want to drop out? What's that threshold of point level? Well, we've been pretty outspoken about that. In the mid-teens, you're kind of in no man's land. What you can't predict is that they're going to, what they're going to change, if anything. Go to a bonus point system or something. Bonus point only or squared bonus point.

And if they do, what I still contend is with the non-resident quota being whittled down to 10% for moose, sheep, and goat, that's still a very low number of tags, even if they go to a squared point system. I mean, look at Montana. Look at Nevada right now for moose, sheep, and goat. They're a squared system. Is it easy to draw with a lot of points still? Nevada, moose, sheep, and goat. No. I said Montana, moose, sheep, goat, and Nevada. They're both squared systems. Yes. And it doesn't matter. If you've got 25, how many people, is it top-heavy people get the points? No. It's just random. Get the tags. I don't think it's a compelling reason if they go to a squared system, you're going to want to do them. Yes, you'll be in the draw mathematically. But, man, those states that already have a squared point system like Nevada and Montana, for moose, sheep, and goat.

I had a guy with 22 points the other day. And those are tough calls. He gets to choose. And I gave him all the draws in Wyoming. And, you know, it's tough. Sheep or moose guy? Sheep. That's a tough one. You don't want to give him up, but he's really not. Break his heart. Yeah. He's really not in the running, you know. Unfortunately. Anyway. Reality. Wyatt, do you have anything to add in on the reality of that? No, I think you guys pretty well covered it there. I believe in getting the elk deer and antelope points. Yes, most definitely. In Wyoming. I get them. I get them for my kids. Bronson, did you get them for all your kids? Women and children. $600. Just worth or something. Yeah, it's tough. It's kind of hard to swallow. There's a lot of opportunity there with those general licensing and different things like that.

And then, of course, if you missed Oregon and it's a must-apply for a state in your portfolio, then you've got until November 30th to get points. Kind of interesting. Most people get points during the application period. Yeah, you can do that. You can't do that in the other two states. We haven't talked a lot about it. We do put it in the publication. And, of course, I mean... That's for somebody that just flat out missed the deadline in Oregon, basically. That's what that reminder is about. This last magazine, we actually, you know, the August-September issue, we also have the opportunity section. It talks about, you know, different things. The guys are looking to do stuff. And, of course, the turn-back tags and some of these reissue tags there in Colorado and whatnot. There's quite a bit going on, so you might check that out if you're a member here at Epic Outdoors.

Well, it's kind of important, too, because some of those things that we mentioned in there, you need to be preparing for, like, the first of December in the case of, say, Idaho or Arizona. Yeah. You know, so, you know, you can't wait until January because it's all over by then, you know. So you've got to prepare a little bit if you want some over-the-counter. Or you can't really call it over-the-counter anymore, I guess. But first-come, first-served, we'll call it tags in Idaho or Arizona for deer, archery deer we're talking. You've got to kind of plan ahead for that December time frame. That's right. December is kind of an important month. Of course, Wyatt, you're looking forward to December. That's when all the renewals come in. All the renewals. Yeah, license application is busy in December. It is. It is. It's busy. It's kind of a fun.

So right now we're right in the middle of hunting season. And Wyatt smashes a freaking giant. And so with that, Wyatt. Some of you might have, I'd like to know by raise of hands, everybody, who even knew why an out attack? In the world? Yeah, yeah. The listeners of the podcast. I mean, there was people that did. We broke the news to about 10,000 or 15,000 people. There were people out there. It was stuck. But they didn't know where. Close to the chest was an understatement. Understatement. But anyway. And he about divorced us a couple of times. Well, like on the bet. I made the bet. And he's like, why'd you bet on me? You know? Everybody's like, why'd you put the. What? Jesus. I'm like ready to do. I had people hitting me. Well, why did. You said Wyatt's going to. What tag does he have? And I'm like, dah. And that's what Wyatt's point is. Well, everybody. Everybody's. I want you too.

Everybody's asking Wyatt. Bronson dang near beat you. He did. He did. I mean, he come within freaking. An opening morning giant. I don't know. Whatever. And so. Just. Anyway. It's only close in grenades. Wyatt blew it out of the water by 20 inches. So, Wyatt, this has been a lifetime, right? Right. Basically, you've got 21 points invested in Utah deer. Yeah. Ever since I was old enough to apply in Utah. Really? I've been applying for mule deer. Yep. Wow. That dates you. Yeah. So, you. And to put that into perspective for everybody else, he hasn't hunted an antelope or an elk either. Right. Because you can only do one as a Utah resident. I had to pick a species. And I'd drawn my mountain goat a few years ago. Yeah. So, I used those points there. And I was sitting on a pile of deer points. Finally had a wet year. Yeah. So, what do you.

What goes into your thought process about which unit to hunt or choose or. I think it's good. Now we can talk about it. Yeah. It's good. Because we had a lot of talks. So, kind of my thinking this year was. And every year. Yeah. We go through this. And every year. We love to tease Wyatt about this because he has these points and he could command attack. Well, in two or three years, we've been kind of jabbing him about it. Yeah. But we had some extreme drought years. And so, he held. He frankly held off. Oh, he did. Yeah. And rightfully so. Yes. Okay. You know, kind of moisture was definitely one thing that really played into it. You know, what our moisture was like. We've definitely been in that drought for a few years. And then also, I was watching units that maybe, you know, were hot units. But maybe it trended down and just trying to catch them on a year when they were coming back up.

Just to get the best value out of my points. Yeah. Is what I was trying to do. Like the Dolores Triangle. Like the Dolores Triangle. So, that didn't cross my mind. But that was probably one of them that could. Probably could have 10 years ago, had you wanted them. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So, such as the Henrys or something like that that used to be the state's best. Arguably the best in the state. Right. Right? 7, 8, 10 years ago. And two or three rough years. Mm-hmm. Largely, you know, due to some of the drought. It's a dry range that pops out of the desert out there. And they're killable. They're very killable. You glass them and kill them. Very stockable. And so, you know. Not as much giant carryover. The hunting pressure can take care of a lot of deer on that unit. Yeah. Right. You know. And so, you can affect the age class a little bit.

So, you're thinking, if people forget about it, maybe the class of hunter, you know. Shift other units for a couple years. We don't have the hardcore trophy hunters applying for the Henrys. Then all of a sudden, we get a little bit of older deer laying around. And then we add water. Right. Basically, it's like, let me be the one to tell the truth. Oh, the world. The Henrys are back. And Wyatt. Are the Henrys back, Wyatt? I wouldn't say back. I mean, I haven't heard of the Henrys a lot in the early years. You don't think 220 is back? Well, I mean. Okay. I remember back in the day, being down there with Adam, actually. Way back when. 2008, 2009. Yeah. All those years. Even until 2013 or 14. Adam, when did you smash your 220? Both of you has smashed your 220. 2017.

2023. Back-to-back 220s. Was that six years or seven years? I don't know what that is. I like it. But, yeah. It's what I meant by back. Yeah. It's not as good as it ever has been. And very, very few places, even Poncagon or other places are not that, or many other places for that matter. The numbers are down. But just, it's back to what we would maybe hold the standard of. You know, 200 to 220 bucks. What you would hope the Henrys would give. That used to be what you hunt on the Henrys. That's what you could usually hope for in a normal year. It's the most incredible. In the last two, three years, those are, you could count on one hand. Maybe the last couple years, they're like those type of deer. Yes. This year, Wyatt, I mean, you spent a crap load of time. Tons. And I don't know how many. It's like Wyatt said, any time of the day, I could drive out there and look at a 180 buck.

Any time I want. Well, and every day, you could look at 200 inches. I mean, they weren't 200 when they were growing in early July. But you knew these deer were going to be 200 plus. Definitely had potential. So, yeah. We found out, what, this year in May, the end of May, that I drew the tag. And I made a trip, actually. What, the first week of June was probably my first trip over there. I was excited. Got a bunch of trail cameras out. Of course, Utah made the new trail camera loss. So, I had to pull them, actually, before they did me a ton of good. I mean, the deer still had a lot of growing. But I spent a lot of days over there. I figured between 35 and 40 days of just scouting and running around that mountain. And, you know, the last, what, two weeks before the season, I had a pretty decent hit list of bucks. Yeah. Really good. And then we approached the turn back time. Yep.

There's 30 days. 30 days. And you were like, and Bronson and I were like, it could go either way. July 20th or whatever, 18, 19, whatever, somewhere. It's like not. 19 or 20. And this was a later, the bucks were a little behind in a lot of places, not just the Henrys. Yeah. So, you thought it was going to be good, but still they weren't done growing yet. Yeah. I was nervous. I was super nervous. It was too the day before the day to turn it in that you were, that you finally made the final call. I actually stayed over there the week before that just to spend every day. And then I came home and showed you guys what I had on video. You're like, do I keep it or not? We kind of debated here at the office and decided we were going to hunt it. It was unanimous. Yeah. I don't think anybody said, you're going to be in trouble. You're going to regret that.

And we all felt like you might find a buck you didn't know about still. Yeah. On top of the hit list. Right. Which kind of happened. Yeah. That is what happened. The hit list bucks though, all, I mean, all turned into, you know, great. Studs. Yeah. Studs. I mean, 205 to 215-ish type deer. I would say every one of the ones that were really on your list. A couple four points are probably like right around 200, but were just awesome. Yeah. Just big, awesome, framey deer. You know, a few with extras. I mean, a lot that I was excited about coming into the hunt. So, I guess we get to, what, the week before the hunt, I headed down there. I guess the hunt would start on a Saturday. And I left Tuesday morning to head down there and just kind of check up on the hit listers. And I'd actually kind of heard rumor of a big deer that I had not seen.

So, I spent a little bit of time down on that end of the mountain. I actually spent three days there before I actually turned that buck up. Jeez. Which was like Thursday night. It was Thursday. Two days before the opener. Yeah, two days before the opener, I found this buck. And he was actually caught him coming up over the skyline, like right at dark. And could just tell instantly that was a deer that needed attention and probably a deer I was going to hunt. Wow. Yeah. So, he was.

Yeah. In an area that he lived the year before, which, of course, you didn't spend a bunch of time there last year. You'd heard from others that there was a deer and he was actually. And the year before he wasn't. No. Near as big. No. And he had a broken beam and stuff. Ended up breaking his beam the year before. Or nowhere near the mass. In velvet, but he broke it. So, he just. Didn't have the extras. No. Yeah. I mean, just. Just a year. Still a great deer, especially for last year. I mean, last year the mountain was down quite a bit. But I think kind of what saved him was he did break a main beam off. And I think, too, it was nice that, you know, your buddies basically said, this deer's bigger. When you see him. When you see him. Yeah. Than the way he videos. Which is true. He doesn't look as good in photos. And I mean. He looks great in live video. But, I mean, he looks.

Like, when you walk up to him. Oh. You're like. Oh. Jeez. Didn't take me long. Yeah. So. This is next level. But anyway. Thursday, guys started to show up. So, you know, me and Devin looked at him on Thursday. Friday. Let's see. Adam, did you show up Friday morning? First thing. Knocked off my hit list right off the bat. Yeah. I went to. Found everybody. I went to. BC and D. Sweet spot. Said. Oh. The text said. So, Josh and I are going to come on Sunday afternoon. And I just can't figure out, like, how you killed in opening morning. Like, I'm like. Oh, yeah. There's no problems. I can take care of all my obligations. And. Come in. He waited until afternoon. It was like 1230. Yeah. Good help is what it come down to. So, anyway. And then the text was. Adam says. Wyatt saw. I should read it. Wyatt saw this big one. And. I saw four shooters. What is that?

Basically. B. B. Through. What is that? D. Or E. Yeah. All over. Where Wyatt basically had them tucked away. Yeah. And. Anyway. It was just like. And Wyatt. It was almost good mornings. But I had a. I had a cheat sheet.

I saw four shooters. And I'm like. Four shooters. Like. Okay. Are we talking. Like. What does that mean? What does a shooter mean? Well. 200. Because there's some guys that shoot two by threes. We'll say they're 200. Bullies don't matter to some people. They're all 200. They're 215 deer. Let's put that one. 200 plus deer. So. So. Big deer. That's what I'm talking about. So funny. One of them was a four point. Yeah. And he was probably about two. But the other three were non-tips. And they were. As far as you guys have heard. Are they all still alive? Or is one. One. One has an arrow somewhere. Yeah. We. We. We. We. We. I. got wounded one poor little so but have not heard anymore on what happened or who it was i guess or what happened if it's still alive or if they didn't recover it so geez but anyway yeah fast

forward so yeah at friday why it has more options than he can handle he was nervous anybody would drive in the direction four miles away but drive why it gets nervous in the office 14 months before just a lot of even deciding what to apply for but i mean a truck would turn at an intersection four miles from his buck but it turned the direction and his heart rate was going up there's just just a lot of pressure with those tags you know we had something special and uh knew he was the one we wanted to hunt so let's see friday what i think's amazing is the henry's is somewhat of a little we've talked about it very easy to glass hunt very stockable and you had this deer to yourself yes yep it's just interesting how they can live under your nose like that a little bit have that remember my deer yeah nobody nobody hunted that was a not a side of the mountain that's calm i don't know if

it's ever i've never seen another big deer there yeah yeah it was a unique people drive by where we killed your deer they drove through us but nobody was hunting the deer remember it was yeah you're you're nervous we were nervous the whole time but well and people are driving by going i'm missing something because there's one too many vehicles and there were some people doing that opening day trust me there was people doing that but they didn't know they weren't and i think wyatt you guys had what b and c teams from other people coming and checking out what everybody else is doing yeah we never saw another hunter with a bow there was not another person just the just but yeah they're the team members yep their team members were were coming through or or just just checking everybody out people i don't know if they had muzzleloader tags or rifle but people people go down there to look at

deer too we did have a game warden yeah and uh what was the other ranger and i've got another state park guy whatever he was checking for those new utv permits was he license plates come on kidding wow i don't know i had his i didn't take my but cash i think he had his on how about the guys that hunt the henrys once in a while with a general tag just assuming that that's part of the general it's within the southeastern boundary it's happened and smoke bucks too and not even really kind of just get a hand slap they were totally ignorant oh they could have lost their truck and went and wives and children what were you saying john i was just gonna say why you were stalking your buck adam we had two or three people stop and and we were right you guys are acting like you're eating a peanut butter sandwich on the tailgate basically yeah i wish archibald was here because he had a few of

those incidents archibald was it it was in probably the he was in the high traffic i wish archibald was here he's he's hunting okay we can't tell you where because we'll get in trouble but he's a good guy but if you're one of those people to stop he he is not that stuck up he's a good guy but what i what i he's so amped up like like he didn't even dare put the spot and scope up on the up on the tripod he's sitting at the truck okay you could probably put the spot and scope on the tripod i just remember looking over him in the heat of the day the sun's coming up glaring off his truck and he is leaning against his truck it had to have been 10 times hotter against his truck but he said i didn't dare i didn't dare move that's how dedicated devon is to anybody that he's helping it's pretty it's pretty impressive all right so go ahead we're not gonna so surprisingly we're

gonna let you talk and we're gonna let you so we're gonna let you finish this friday as as bronson sucks down some nerds was the day before the hunt i was able to i guess i wasn't able to but we did keep track of the deer all day friday so devon and i watched him that morning i went and checked on some other bucks that evening and another buddy you know picked him up that night and watched him until dark so we were able to uh to keep track of of the deer most of the day or or i guess all day friday but it seems like when you were when you were on the stalk is when you really understood how big this deer was like even though even though you've watched him he's a big deer you're gonna shoot him you're gonna hunt him you're past that but then when you were right next to him yeah all the guys that had seen him had told me oh he's bigger than he looks he's bigger than he looks he's

bigger than he looks and anyways i i'd been looking at him from a few miles away when i was when i was glassing in there so the next morning we all get set up kind of get a plan get guys out on the points end up finding the buck pretty quick i mean it was still maybe gray light still 15 minutes after not even having to really slow roll the pines yeah there was no pines no why and i would but we were slow rolling the oak well yeah we were on the henry we were ready to make a move adam and i had all the glassers on point and anyways kind of got a a weird win that we haven't gotten a while um or hadn't had you know this storm coming through this hurricane kind of deal kind of get shifted the wind it was going the complete opposite direction what it normally blows down there so it kind of made coming from the east a little bit it was kind of coming from the

north like in the summer which is not ever common and and like stiff like not just a oh there's a little thermal you know swirl this is steady yeah so i and you've got a lot of i get out i'm blowing i'm blowing light the cigarette lighter it's doing it the talc's blowing the same way so i'm like what we better try this yeah we probably sat there for what 20 30 minutes just kind of made sure the wind was stable believe that yeah but it stayed so take off yeah then i i got out and tried my tried my stock there was able to drop down into kind of the level the buck was at just kind of hang out i mean i was there for within 100 yards of him for what three hours or three hours three hours or so before i then the wind changed then the wind changed the wind came and it was it was pretty terrible at that point i was trying to get get north of him so now the wind would be normal so i was i

was trying to get get out there away from him i guess or so i backed up got over and i finally could figure out exactly where the deer was um off the description finally got it all figured out and started started to work my way in there to where they thought i could see the deer from had a little bit better wind wasn't ideal but had a little bit better wind but i figured it was kind of kind of now or never he was already in tight too yeah i was i was too tight i'd been within 100 for too long yeah and just like gotta try it i'm here so i kind of worked down devon walked me into a boulder i popped up on that boulder as i came up over the top of it all i could see was horns and top of a head above the oak not his eyes feeding yeah this is at like 12 15 in the afternoon in the afternoon he's just picking off those broad daylight sun there he is big as life at 40 yards

and he did look absolutely giant he was that's just why i think the words were he was big as shh yeah he was big as samu yeah he was he's got a just a big head on going away just big looks to him yeah so he's sitting there just picking picking oak leaves and i'm trying to i mean i'm in some tall oak too and he's in tall oak and we're just trying to find i'm just trying to find an angle i have him at 40 yards and it feels like he was there for 10 minutes but i mean this was really what probably a couple minutes that that i actually had that had the deer found so he starts kind of kind of feeding his way back towards where he was bedded earlier and there's two lanes i think i'm gonna get a shot right there at 40 and he just goes through those lanes too quick i mean just as i'm trying trying to

draw he just doesn't even hesitate in those lanes so other than that i mean his body's covered up and i just have head and horns so finally starts working towards a lane that i think is going to be a really good lane and i'm high i'm pretty pretty high strong i'm pretty excited at this point you know so first i if i remember right i couldn't even lift my pineal at 40 yards i had a hard time lifting my pineal i got them up but then they were shaking so bad i was getting ranges from 80 to 20 yards i i i didn't know that i could make it happen at that point that's why you bowhunt right there i love it but the more time i spent with the deer of course the more i kind of got up in the zone and calmed down and yeah kind of you know you have time worked my nerves over a little bit so i got him in a i knew a lane he was headed for a lane it looked like he was going to make and that

would be my last lane before it dropped off the next shelf if he would have dropped off that next shelf it would have been just time to back out and and start again but i was able to kind of work my way up around this last little patch of oak and i mean it was a straight shot in there the buck was in there feeding at 60 yards had his head in the bush just quartered away from me super super hard but it's actually a really good angle when you're trying to put an arrow in something so i was able to just get him right behind the last rib and i mean it come out and stuck perfect it's somewhere in his collarbone or i mean it's stuck within an inch or two of being just perfect yeah i mean it was just perfect couldn't ask for any better and why it's like a pretty good archer you realize he's heart shot an elk at 90 yeah and like the last i guess three years two years he

doesn't want to talk about it but he's two years apart he's good yeah he's let two arrows fly it's kind of luck it's a 375 220 but why it haynes comes to mind anyway so he he i could see the arrow hitting him and i knew it was you know it was in something good i knew it was gonna gonna be a fatal shot so i let the guys know hey he's hit and before i could end the end the traffic there on the radio they'd already hit me that they'd watched him die so he just did a hundred yards sprint basically yeah did the death run pretty much yeah i didn't actually see it i was like the other buck he was with i picked up that movement followed him and by the time i realized it wasn't him the other one was down in the brush but anyway did not i don't know four or five seconds what something like that maybe six but you know what i mean he was dead

fast he died pretty pretty quick and i was able to you know a lot of good friends there what waited for them to come family blood trail yeah family and waited for him to blood trail it with me and made it down there to him and gosh he's just awesome he grew on the ground most definitely absolutely 34 inches yeah he's 34 inches outside so 209 inch frame 11 inches of trash yeah yeah i mean come on what other dimensions do we got bronson i don't know 29 inch beam on one side yeah he's just impressive i mean he grew on the ground the closer we got to him and just actually put my hands on him it was just just awesome faces or something else worth the uh 21 year weight yeah you got every you got everything out of that yeah you maximize the tag we kept saying this is a henry mountains buck and and what that means is they're those big deer they're giant bodied and he was that he was big

bodied but heavy just the next level they do not cheat their way when they get big there they don't cheat their way to 200 their frames get really big their bodies are big their heads are blocked anyway he was just the prototypical henry mountains giant so the henry's are back well there's gonna be a number of big deer taking on the henry's but every unit's gonna have a number yeah i mean it's just been awesome so far i mean we've seen big deer out of nevada some big deer out of utah so they're yeah big deer out of utah big deer showing up in new mexico i mean nothing out of idaho crickets out of idaho and wyoming crickets but montana they're just about to kick off montana it's gonna be it's gonna be a good year up there you know you're offending somebody they're gonna call you oh i know they're gonna send me a picture of a two and a two hundo yeah if you kill

if you know about a buck that's two hundo email me jason at send me the photo i want to see it i love big deer anyway because muleys matter all right why congratulations hey thank you guys doesn't get better than that yeah it was it was awesome that'll be actually a youtube episode coming up well yeah and you're gonna see a ton of why it's scouting footage to the summer you're gonna see a lot of awesome bucks it'll be really a lot of live footage of deer um i'm sure it's going to add to point creep a little bit on the henry's archery hunt for 2024 but why it doesn't go from 20 points or whatever to 23 21 i'm out of the pool 21 to 23 let's crush it why it's in for elk we're already trying to talk him into applying one of the december archery elk hunts next year with zero points yeah i don't know that

i'm man enough for a december elk hunt what do you mean you gotta be elk are meant to be hunted in september it's right that's what they're made for you might have to wait 21 years to do that why you might draw the first year on that december one deer deer in august elk in september deer in october deer in november deer in december how about that yep perfect what do we got here so the new hunt episode we did have a new hunt episode come out on on the youtube at epic outdoors.com which episode is it that's the youtube channel yeah youtube channel at epic outdoors it's uh devin had a uh mule deer hunt that he filmed droppers get you dropped is what we called it i know you called it droppers get you dropped is that because so you don't offend all the well you can't say because you want to say droppers get you killed right you can't say you can't say

that all kinds of flags you can't you can't advertise or search i like droppers get you drop i thought sounded punchy it's fine it's kind of i mean it's fine i would just i figured you i tweaked that one uh-huh yeah it makes you less searchable but it's a it's a good episode devin did a great job filming it julie fawn he he ended up with a sweet buck so do you need to give a shout out to his wife who filmed part of it she's hilarious it's so funny so it's kind of watching those clips his wife was cracking us up for sure yeah all right that's the downside is you got to give all your raw footage to these guys and they get to laugh their guts out while you're at home don't even know that don't even know you're laughing at you you're the butt of a joke exactly you can just assume that i am laughing at you you'll be safe chris laughed at us non-stop all right so anyway uh epic youtube's

up and cranking again we kind of took a little bit of a break on that but we've got a lot of episodes coming out and uh you know we'll get cranking on that break is just sometimes you can only do so much so anyway we're gonna make that a priority and get that cranking uh anything else we gotta we want to shout out let's throw a shout out to triple s polaris uh specializing in custom builds for hunters we've got a custom razor just an incredible machine it just eats up the hills and uh does 70 while doing how about that it's incredible so anyway if you're looking at a getting a new machine whether it be a four-wheeler side by side whatever uh the generators i e-bikes it seems like he sells anything uh 435-865-0100 435-865-0100 triple s polaris triple s sounds for you know kind of stands for a

couple of things but anyway this one's a little different something in the wolf yeah something like the shoe shovel and shut up shut your mouth you know this next one why it might be the best candidate to talk about the hoyt bows oh yeah after the shout out to hoyt yeah you guys talked about those shots i've made the last couple years on my archery hunt it's it's definitely credited to a lot of the bow i shoot i mean i've never shot this well in my life since i picked up the new hoyt bow and i i would say that's uh probably what's made these hunts happen well and you got a you shoot a carbon right yep five or seven five yep rx5 but uh you might be giving them a little too much credit why you have skills i've shot bows quite a bit but i've never shot a bow that shoots as good as this while the deer's

buddies taken off on a full sprint yeah and you thread the needle it was just kind of high pressure but no i say the same thing i mean they shoot better than i can shoot that's exactly yeah they do they shoot better than i can and that's all i need and i and i can get better yes i know i've got my faults but if the bow's better than me that's what you want yeah that's what you want rifle muzzleloader everything archery yes i'd recommend that bow to anybody so anyway go on go online get your get a hoyt bow coming yeah i guess by next year or if you've got a late season december archery elk hunt this year in utah summer it's probably not too late to get you enough boy to set up by two i had ice my my limbs iced up and that i mean that oh yeah mountain lions and your wheel had ice and when you drew it back it just just it came off yeah nothing nothing no no every bow would have done

that every bow would have done it so yeah it was like it got a little western that was in the lion on the ground got a little western it's in the uana basin where it's like negative always negative in the winter it's a very cold experience it was legal but it was western all right so now we're now we're here at fierce fierce firearms uh just incredible lineup of rifles these guys have got going that kind of the new one that's super exciting kurt uh that works with us here has done for years and years and years anyway he ended up with the mountain reaper and i swear brownson i'm freaking buying one but anyway uh just uh an incredible lineup these guys know what they're doing and it's it's very feels like a custom rifle a very affordable price you're not much more than out of like a box type rifle so anyway you can go online check it check them out at fierce firearms if

you find something you like don't forget to order through us we deal in them and uh there's nobody going to beat us in price so anyway go check out something that you might want there that what i do like about fierce too is you get them in a timely fashion this isn't like three and four years down the road even a year and a half not none of that you're going to be able to have a firearm in fairly short order all right do we got anything else boys no not a lot else we do have uh 40 off coupons on our website epic outdoors.com for ua gear any if you're needing some gear 40 off of anything they sell on ua.com also you can go to our website to get to the mewley's matter page of course we're kind of excited about the mewley's matter and uh if you don't punch a deer tag and you have one uh then you know consider turning it in to us here at epic outdoors and we'll throw your

tag in the bin and have a manual drawing of tags that's going to be a bunch of colors of tags that we're going to draw green for colorado splattering white for utah what else we got gray in nevada right some states do some yellows now and then but i don't know you got blues and places it seems like yeah i don't know it's gonna be anyway we spin that thing it is gonna be a rainbow when we spin that bin and then we've also got a guy that called in just barely and said something asked about the doe tags says do you have drawings for dope dropping bombs on moms yes we are going to have details on the website too unused doe tags there are some parameters on there i think state wise and stuff like that you can read about it on the mewley's matter.com website yeah yep yep yep all that so anyway why anything else kind of worn you out of your story no i wish devin i wish devin would was here

he's he was uh instrumental oh he was there and uh and he's very passionate i just he's a great great storyteller and anyway he could have told us how he was a thousand degrees and had to roll dehydrated oh yeah he was dehydrated i looked over there one time hydrated in a truck because he didn't get up there move he didn't move and i i looked over it once and i i mean i i wasn't beeping or anything but i mean i'm i'm a mile yeah and the the deer is between me and devin yeah so literally i kind of have to look up and he's at the top of my yeah i don't pier 12s i asked him if he had his pants off one time yeah i could see his bare leg and i'm like what are you doing nobody wears shorts hunting yeah he hiked them up yeah he hiked them all the way so he had them rolled up so anyway it was just

kind of small talk when we were during that three hour period why it was talking about when it's like you know the deer is all bedded and you know what has everybody got in their pack to eat and you're just you know yeah there's nothing talking about no could i anyway it'll be fun he won't listen to this podcast so if you guys out there listening to this if we if you can kind of tell that we're going to jab him a little bit about this well we'll just bring it up at a weird time and just say you know has anybody glassed with their pants off just see what he has to say he won't even be prepped because he won't listen to this yeah it's pretty awesome well now wyatt's hanging around the office here yeah rightfully so yeah plan on taking a little bit more time for that hunt but i won't complain about it being done opening morning that's for sure neither will your wife yeah yeah and future

family all right okay everybody that's it we gotta head out it's thursday which is friday around here we'd like to thank all of our sponsors here at epic outdoors for top of the line hunting clothing and apparel in every environment visit underarmor.com we'd like to thank under armor for being our title sponsor and making this podcast happen visit our website epicoutdoors.com for discount codes to under armor hunting apparel handcrafted quality precision rifles from start to finish red rock precision is one of our sponsors and many of our staff uses red rock rifles visit red rock precision dot com to find out more if you're in the market for a hunting property our sponsor at saint james sporting properties specialize in premier hunting properties throughout the west check out available hunting properties at saint james sporting properties dot com good looking comfortable camo

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