EP 334: Changes to Utah Mule Deer Hunting and a New Mexico Elk Hunt

You're listening to the Epic Outdoors podcast brought to you by the Western Hunting and Conservation Expo and Utah Life Elevated. This is an event we don't miss. So come and see the whole Epic Outdoors crew February 13th through 16th, 2025 in Salt Lake City, Utah. For more details, go to HuntExpo.com.

Hey, what's up, everybody? Jason Carter, Adam Bronson, John Peterson, Joshua F. Bollock. Start over. Josh. What's up, Josh? No, we're not starting over. Let's get this freaking show on the road. We're losing people. We've been here for how many months, Bronson? What do you mean? Days. Years? What are we talking about? Days. Days. We came in. We wrote a publication. And that's it. That's where we're at. Starting December, what? One, two, three, four. Whenever one goes to the printer. There's always a little bit of exuberance emitted from the office. John even's smiling. He's smiling. I don't know why he's smiling. He's caught up on sleep. He was trying to whiteboard you and I with the ads. We don't whiteboard ads, John. Did we ever told you that? Hey, everybody, you know what whiteboarding is? Tell us what whiteboarding is, John. Sounds like waterboarding.

But if any of you out there have ever thought, how hard is it to control Jason? I don't like it. It's basically impossible. Well, he's like, you got to say this ad. No, I'm going to say it the way I want to. By the way, anybody that's not at the expo, you're a loser. They're the title sponsor of this podcast. If you want to be somebody, you're going to go to the expo. February 13 to 16, get yourself a freaking room. Let's do this. Find us at the booth. Let's talk hunting. Buy some optics. We're going to have some amazing prices. And what else, John? Oh, we're going to apply for a $5 freaking 200 tags. We're waiting for that many minutes. Maybe you're going to freaking buy a conservation tag. Who knows? There's all kinds of conservation tags. Bronson, you even looked at the list the other day. Finally came out. What did you see on there? Oh, some interesting tags. Oh, yeah? What? Lots.

Lots of species on there. With the clean slate you got. I've got a wide open. Clean slate and a new rifle. Oh, yeah. The 6.5 Creedmoor. That ain't a new rifle. It's not a need more. That ain't a new rifle. Right? So, tell us about this awesome rifle. We freaking had some projects today, Bronson. Well, that was a secondary project to the primary project. It was just to put a new Zeiss. All right? The new Zeiss? V8 armor. What is it? The V8? Yeah. Awesome scope. I drink one every day, so I figured I better put one on my gun. That gun? That gun? That gun's been mauled and abused? Which gun? Oh, dude. Which gun? Which one? That gun has only had a V4 and it went to a V8. Now it's not for sale. Then it's up for sale. Not the 7 PRC. The 6.5 Creedmoor has had a scope mounted multiple times. All we've been able to do, we can't get it to go away. We can just suppress it. That's right.

That's the truth. We think it's gone and it comes back. So, we mount this new one, the V8 or whatever it is, which is an amazing scope, by the way. I can't wait. Devin and I. So, I just decided to throw that on a different gun that was in my safe that was scopeless. And so... The V4, right? Needed a home, right? Yeah, threw it back on. And I figured it's a usable gun now. The gun that was for sale was now not for sale. And you guys are, by the minute... Most amazing gun ever. By the minute, you guys are making me want to... One hour after we mounted the scope, Josh, what did he say? He said, basically... I said it's for sale for $1,000. Exactly. More than it was yesterday. Exactly. And you know what's funny? Sometimes, here at Epic, we find this to be true. The more expensive tags or hunts or the higher quality of the experience, the easier they are to sell.

Add two grand, Bronson, price sale by tomorrow. But then, after it was for sale for $1,000 more than it was yesterday, now it's the 2025 gun of the year that is going to be used on every... These guys... In fact, if you guys talking... Bronson, you got a Coos deer coming up? Perfect for a 6.5 Needmore. That's in a few days. I already have another dialed gun. It's the inatimal. I said, give me a species. We're like Coos deer. He throws out some fallow deer like I got to go down to Australia and hunt something. It was a Coos deer? No. He threw out a fallow deer. Let's call it a cows. Cows deer. I said a 400-inch bull elk. Okay. You give me the tag, I'll shoot it with it. Okay? Okay. Okay, but the Coos deer is the most perfect species known to man for a Needmore. I don't know. That occurs in a few weeks. And so, what did he say, Pollock? Bah! Well, I got a side of it. I got a side of it.

I got a project. Christmas. I don't want to go out and dope it and all that. It's just a family project. I've got other guns that are dialed perfectly. Exactly. And I just want to go with that confidence. So, nevertheless, it is suppressed. If anybody's interested, give them a call. Get them on the right day. Probably save a couple grand. You guys are getting me more galvanized by the second. I might not hunt with anything but that gun this year just to prove everybody wrong and then sell it with a list of the things that it killed that year. Anyway, so we had projects of epic proportions this morning. We had a couple of Bronson projects. John, we were lightning a trigger for you. Pretty soon, we're opening up epic freaking... Triggers. Whatever. Gunsmithing. What did you get the poundage down to? A two. It was a four. Yeah. Yeah, it was. No.

Devin pulled it and it was like mid threes this morning. Well, last time he pulled it, it was almost four. Okay. It was like... I just dare you to question Devin on anything. I'm not going to... I mean, he's not here right now. Of course. A single shot 12 gauge doesn't have a trigger that hard. So, it had to be fit. Oh, geez. So, anyway, we did. We fixed it now. But in order to do that, you got to take the whole thing apart, John. Now, you've got projects, you and Adam could take your projects together and paint some targets. Yep. We got to paint some targets. And you might even find some other people down there. John's is going to be really close. Mine? Shooting some of your painted targets.

So, pretty fun. Anyway, we're still kind of in that mode of excited. I guess we're still excited. I don't know. I was... Of what? Just coming out of the field and then now we're still dealing with our gear, which normally we're throwing, putting it back in the safe. Yeah. Putting everything up, calling it a day, but then there's projects. New toys. New optics. You get a five-minute break between phone calls and out come the projects. So... Christmas wishes come to pass. Anyway, pretty fun stuff. All of these things we're talking about, of course, we sell. We sell fierce firearms. We're selling CVA muzzlers if there's anything you need for, say, even Christmas or whatever. John, we've also got some gift cards on our website. Yes, we do. Pretty easy to grab. Pretty easy to grab. Tell us about them real quick. Yep. Logan. You just put... Logan did them. Whatever amount.

You want to make prepaid. Go on our website. You choose an amount, a prepaid amount, and then it sends you a little gift card, and you can either choose to send it to somebody else or keep it for yourself. And all digital with digits. Right? You type in these digits. It's all digital. It keeps track of it for you. You can use it. Digital with digits. Digital with digits. Well, I'm used to... You can delay it, which is cool. So it'll deliver on Christmas. You can buy it now and send it on Christmas. So they'll get an email Christmas morning. Bling. Yep. Wow. I may have screwed the first one up that we did. What? Really? Just barely. You had an extra zero. It was $100, and you loaded it for $1,000? There was a note. There was a note in a guy's file that said there was a gift card present. Oh. I may have said, hey, I see here. Oh, no. You have a gift card. Oh, you did that?

You ruined Christmas for his wife. I see you've got a gift card from a carry. Do you know her? Well, I figured $200 was a sizable amount that he would like to put towards a pair of $3,000 pair of binos that he was wanting to buy. And he was oblivious to the fact that he had a credit on file. After Christmas and by two, Josh. And his wife now is mad at us and will never call us again. So now we've got an angry member. All because you're trying to do the right thing. It's what I do. It's all about perspective, right? That's what we're talking about. I thought I was helping with customer service. Well, we promise we won't call you and tell you about any gift cards on file before Christmas. We learned our lesson on the first card that was bought. After that, we might email you and tell you, use it or lose it. Right? By when? January 1st? We've got all kinds.

But, John, we also have blankets, epic, all kinds of stuff. Epic. Right, John? Yeah, all kinds of merch. We hate that word. That's a flatty name. Merch and dice. I got some merch. I don't like swag, but I like it better than merch. Anyway. Yeah, coffee mugs. We've got shoes. We're selling shoes, for crap sakes. I mean, how do you like yours, Jason? All right. Isn't that amazing? I ordered, what, 10 pairs? Yeah, Jason ordered 10 pairs of the shoes. They were pretty awesome. Okay. Don't do anything halfway. Okay, now don't say who it's for. Oh, okay. You're going to do the Pollock thing. I'll write down a cut right there. It's all good. Your kids are all used to presents like that. It's fine. You can leave it. It doesn't matter. But, yeah, the shoes are pretty awesome. In fact, that's maybe even a leak of the new epic camo, but whatever. That's not going to happen. Right, John?

Get yours now. It's kind of like a rookie trading card for a baseball player. You might want to get the first ones. First gen. First and only. It's kind of like the first gen. All right. So, anyway, when we started out, we're done. Whiteboarding again, John. We never did define whiteboarding for the people. But the people is when whiteboarding, when John hands you something and says, read this word for a word. No. No. Not doing it. It's kind of like when we had to. I don't know the last time that happened. Well, dude. Kind of. When has that happened, brother? I was saying, hey, cover these points. I was watching our Facebook ad the other day, the one where me and you were standing here talking about our drive. Yellowstone. And what were we looking at? The screen. And the camera's right here, and I'm talking over here because I was told, read that what's on there. Read that screen.

Don't you remember that? We're terrible readers. I mean, I critiqued myself, and it looked like crap. Very rarely do we need a take two on the podcast, but we're terrible readers. Don't ask me to read. I'm illiterate. Yeah. I'm afraid I'm going to mispronounce something, but if you just tell me to talk, we'll come up with something. I'm like, what's your gen again? Mine? Gen Z? Yeah, Gen Z. I'm like a Gen Z. They don't know how to spell. They just start, and then it finishes a forum. It autocorrects. All right? Tell me I'm right. Come on.

I'm not illiterate. No, you're not. Well, anyway. We're not saying anything. All right. So what we started off this podcast before Logan hit record, we were talking about straight wall cartridges and unscoped rifles and things like that. Why? Why were we talking about that? Some people are interested in hunts like that, and Logan happens to have a place in his backyard that he may find himself hunting mule deer this year. I don't know. I took a hit this year, yeah. Yeah. We've got a few changes in Utah. That's a big win for those of us. The silent majority of Utah. Logan. I would like to know how many the silent majority is. What does that mean? I don't know. He keeps saying that word like it's a lot, but I haven't heard. Millions. Billions. Millions and millions. Millions and millions. It's like the unsilent minority.

That unsilent minority. Man, they're jerks. Anyway, well, you're talking. So what? You wanted to talk about Utah a little bit? Yeah. I just think we should talk about some of the changes. Like, there's changes, maybe some of which we're in favor of or we're not. But nevertheless, it creates new SKUs and changes, and we kind of like that. SKUs. You know? SKUs. New hunt codes, spread out applicants, and I don't know. Josh, for example, Josh's favorite general unit's now $15 per hunter does. Kind of, they reduce the ratio to help the herd. Yeah. Help the health of the herd. Josh, you need to say thank you. All right. Yes, thank you. Utah DWR for listening to the silent majority. We also have a new limited entry unit on the Thousand Lakes, which is going to be a great skew for people to burn a bunch of points on this year. That's right. Lots of people, right? I hope. No.

So few tags over there. People that I don't want in my book. Yeah. That's right. That's a good point. Spread them out. More SKUs, the better. We are in favor of SKUs. We like SKUs. But anyway. We've got so many SKUs now. We've got so many SKUs that are like five to ten tags. We call them special interest groups. And, you know, it all goes along with this. The Dems have last, prior to Trump. Prior to the Trump era, we're just special interest groups. It's probably quicker to talk about the hunts in Utah that we don't do than the ones we do. Because the list is much shorter than the ones we don't have in Utah. We have everything. You mean like, for example. For example. Like, where are you going? I'm trying to track, but I'm just wondering where you're going. The SKUs and the different spreading out of hunting stuff. But good grief. I mean, if you can dream it, Utah will pass something.

It's nice to think about something. I think more or less, correct me if I'm wrong, you know, is they're trying to come up with creative ways to allow hunting opportunity and maybe minimize the harvest to a degree. So you can offer more tags and more opportunities and things like that. But on general, they're trying to, you know, they want to increase harvest because we've got two-point crops coming up. And I don't know if they want to increase the overall harvest, but like that would be give more tags, maintain the harvest rate, but give more tags. So lots of people are spending money, you know. And I'm not saying they're just all about the money. I'm just saying in their minds, creating a lot of opportunity, taking out a certain amount of the segment and increasing the health of the herd by going 15 bucks per hundred does or whatever on our general.

And the general affects most everybody. And I don't know that, you know, like our specific region didn't seem like the vocal minority, which we say this in jest, the vocal majority totally, totally didn't want it. Didn't want it down here, but the Wildlife Board, you know, elected to just kind of keep the state uniform, at least of what was proposed. Well, when you're king for a day. When you're king for a day, you can wave the magic wands. You get to do what you want. Yes, yes. You know, and so anyway, so here we are. Now it'll be interesting. You're going to find this stuff in the February issue of the Epic Outdoors publication as well as, you know, on our website and whatnot. We're going to continue to talk about it. And Utah just seems like it was a very passionate, aggressive subject for the last few weeks. And so it's on our mind and people are talking about it.

And so we're talking about it for a quick second. I'm over it. I'm done talking about it. Over it. Yeah. Just make sure this year, I guess the main thing, just make sure before you just go blindly apply for something, dig a little deeper. Make sure you thumb through the magazine. I would read the Utah portion. I'm not going to cover some of those hunts in the Utah section. Well. I'm just, so read the website. I'm not going to probably cover, you know, the cash general hunt for deer. Well, they, we don't care about them, but they really care about us. But I'm just saying, so you may not read about all of those in there, but don't just apply for a general unit because you've always hunted there. Yeah. Like Logan and some of his, you know. You know, family, crew. Hey. We're related. You're going to have to buy new guns. We're related somehow, Logan. You're going to have to buy new guns.

You are a part of the cronies. I am. Those are my people. Nevertheless, you know, you just don't know how some of this is going to affect hunting down the road. So we've got this new plan. We're going to do some limited weapons. It's called weapon restrictions. Three units in the whole state. They're going to try some. Open sight rifles. Old fashioned. You know. If grandma tried it, though, you can too, Jay. Well, and grandma shot 14 of deer that weren't hers. Yeah. That's right. Okay. So let's just. Let's just. That's the way it was. Grandpa shot a lot of grandma's bucks. That's 100% true. And grandma just posed for a picture. And so here's grandma with this open sight thing. The other thing you forget is if grandma could kill one with a 30-40 Craig in 1952, there was a lot of deer. 100%. A lot of deer to be. 100%.

You can shoot two bucks as a bullet, but eventually you're going to kill a deer. So. Okay. Okay. Right? Well. So don't give me those. That's when you. Stop with those memes, please. They had a good time. But anyway. Okay.

Okay. Let's move on. How do we fix this podcast? No, we're done. We're done with Utah. So just pay attention like Josh said. So the deer is a very passionate subject. Here we are. And we're watching things change before our very eyes. Didn't do the four-pointer better. There was proposed to be four-pointer better down here on Pine Valley. And I don't know if it'll work or not. Most of it. But nevertheless, they just, nah, we're not going to do that one, but we're going to go ahead and do the weapon restrictions and force everybody to kind of change their ways. Buy a bunch of new guns and weapons for families and stuff. And I do think there are going to be bucks that slip through the cracks. Oh, they will. But when you crank tags. You also might wound more than you ever did before, too. And when you crank tag numbers going along in the study, how do you know if the study really worked?

That's right. You know, if you leave tags the same and all of a sudden you've got all these bucks and bucks for everyone. That was thrown out on the table, but the division didn't want to get painted in the corner that they couldn't raise tags. Right. And now they can actually raise tags without talking about it to the general public. But anyway, nevertheless, kind of interesting. They also lowered the limited entry and premium limited entry buck-to-doe ratio objectives, too. To go ahead and issue more tags on the Ponce and Henry's and things like that. What were some of the percentages they threw out? Hypothetically, we're not holding anybody. I heard it was like 15 to 20-something percent, maybe. Yeah, I heard upwards to 30, potentially. I mean, I don't know. I was talking to a guy in Bronson. I brought this up. And, Pollack, you might have heard it. I don't know.

We're on the phones a lot here. But anyway, you and I talked about it at our offices right next to each other, talking to an outfitter. And he was talking about Arizona. And it was kind of a, it kind of resonated with me a little bit. I'll just bring it up. He said, you know, generally speaking, from 20 years ago, 10 years ago, whatever, you know, Arizona's quality of elk was such and such. It was such awesome some years, depending on weather and things like that. But generally speaking, better than it is in this day and age. Why this day and age? He says, like, what do you think, you know? And we were talking about it. And he says, I contend that our tag numbers have roughly been the same on some of these units for 10, 20 years. And they have. If you look over the history. Pretty, pretty. Yeah. You know how to kill elk. They give them both of their tags.

They don't have a lot of predators other than us. Yeah. So just, they're not sensitive. Everything wants to kill a deer. A lot of tags for, in November, December with rifles. Very consistent issuance of tags. Very few early. Archeries are always kind of about the same. Late rifles, 500, 600, whatever. But what's changed over 20 years? Yeah. The method of taking all of our technologies. Optics. Long range guns. And optics. Long range guns. And he says, I don't care if you're talking about Onyx, Camo. I don't care what you're talking about. The level of intensity and the intense pressure because the lack of the resource creates even more intense pressure. Point creep. Maybe affluency. Stuff like that, too. People hiring people. All of these things. Point creep to where you're going to treat it like something special because you don't get a tag very often down there.

And he says, but the tag numbers haven't followed that. They've stayed the same or higher. Over the course of time. You're just killing more elk. Period. That's his point. And you're better at killing more elk. You're better at killing high quality elk. He's a, you know, and you get to thinking about it in some of these stories because we're talking to the outfitters because we just covered Arizona, by the way, which will be out on our website soon and is at the printer. It's done, actually. We're just. Yeah. So it's kind of top of mind of what we're talking about. But he's like, you just see the difference. You see the change, but we're not reacting tag numbers wise to all of the effects of these technologies and increased pressures of sorts. Everywhere in the, almost every part of the state's talking about the same thing. Just general. We're talking about that here.

We're talking about that here in Utah over deer or whatever it is. Nevada has their fair share of these same issues. Every state has these. And then you throw in a tough winter or droughts or whatever. And then the passion comes out in all of us and everybody's angry. And anyway, there we are. Kind of fun. We're actually, before we leave Utah, let's just go back to it real quick. Do we need to talk any more about it? No. We'd left. We were in Arizona last. Pollock, you're not very passionate about it, right? No. I mean, you stood up and you felt like your voice was heard. You act like you've got to have. You've got to have. I love. You've got to get. Pollock's thinking about things, Bronson, that we don't even know. I know, but you're trying to get the Viking in him to just bell or something out over the stern of the ship.

I love how he just nonchalantly throws something pretty well thought out. Let's put it this way. And maybe even hits you to the core. He has an hour in the morning, an hour tonight to rehearse things in his head that I'd like sometimes know what he's rehearsing. Not me. Not me. It's scary. The speeches I prepare.

Coming to and from. Do you? No. Do you? No. These just come off the tip of your tongue? Yes. Well, anyway. So Pollock and Bronson, you guys always work, you know, back in the day, everybody knows you worked for Game and Fish. And so, again, you're dealing with some of the people that you know well and whatnot. And so, yeah, this creates a little bit more passion even and whatnot. It'll be interesting to see what the changes are going to bring. There's a lot of people that are passionate about it and they've got some changes that are pushed through and we'll see what it does. What I think is pretty amazing, actually, is we've been out on the winter range. Just the overall numbers of deer. It's impressive. We've seen a positive change in environmental conditions and I think we're seeing that out on the winter range. Oh, yeah. There's a pile of deer out there. There's going to be more.

And, I mean, granted, keep in respect, we're talking since three years ago. Okay. Two to three year old deer. I'm not saying 20 years ago, it doesn't even compare. Right. Right. But in the last five years, for sure. We're talking a modest uptick. It looks good. Yes. Yep. Oh, there is. There is. We're also going into what's, as of now, one of the driest winters we've had in two I can't believe it. So. Yeah. We've got snow plows ready. Oh, for what? Yeah. I mean. I mean. And it's not just here. It's Arizona, New Mexico. They have nothing down there. So, we need something to turn on. But you did mention something about powder chasers. Talking about all this snow going to Lake Powell. Well. 24 inches up there in Wyoming. Yeah. But that's the Green River watershed. Yeah. That's good for Wyoming. Yeah. And we need some of that down here. Yeah. But yeah. Josh.

I think he might have said it on a podcast. But this Farmer's Almanac stuff, it better start to come into fruition. Because we need some. Farmer's Almanac. I looked at it when it did show a good, positive outlook for the spring. Yeah. It was actually probably for wildlife and deer. Probably the best conditions you could ask for. Wild. I'm going to read it. I actually screen show it. Well, wasn't this kind of like what last year was too? More or less. We had no winter last year until when? About January, February. Yeah. But. But there again, we could discuss some of the effects of that. I felt like when you hunted the Ponscot, we know guys that came off the strip really hard. Kayababs, Nevadas. Kind of average or maybe just under average. Yeah. But the timeliness of it maybe. It wasn't. Or maybe it's. It wasn't terrible. But it wasn't.

Sometimes you're also dealing with just natural cycles. Yeah. Nevada wasn't either. But we're also dealing. Goes back to that. But those dry years, we're just, we've got low numbers of column five, six, eight year old bucks. And I know on a general unit, those are almost non-existent. But I'm talking even on limited entries. Some of the best units in Nevada just didn't produce that. Well, same thing with the strip. Same thing with some of the southern Utah units. But like Pons was just, just a good year. It wasn't phenomenal. I think you're dealing with, like Adam saying, age classes. There's several years of age classes a deer gone. That were missing for two or three years. Especially our mature stuff. So there's bucks that can't even quite grow what we're expecting them to grow in their minds because they're not mature enough to do that.

Or that they're just, they were born on years too when, I believe that it is true because I've seen it when you see it, but there's a lot of these mature deer were born on years where it was incredible drought and that kind of thing. So they just, they've shown that that stuff can affect them throughout their life. So maybe they just don't have the potential to be as good as we want them to be either as we can see them. So we're kind of dealing with a lack of age class in deer. And then the deer that are there probably aren't meeting the full potential of what they could have because they were born on some pretty tough years. Exactly. Never started off good. Yeah. So if you start off good, you end good. If you start off tough shape, studies have shown you end in tough shape. That's my thought. As far as antler growth potential.

You know, we're saying it was, because it was actually not a bad year on the Ponce. No, it wasn't bad. It was average, but it wasn't great or good or amazing. But you take a 2018 deer, that was a rough year. Yeah. 2017 and 19 were awesome. Yeah. 18 was brutal. And so you're dealing with last year, that's a five or six year old deer or whatever. And so I think part of that, we subconsciously or even consciously take that into consideration. I think we have no problems understanding year to year fluctuations. It's the, it's more of a five to six year management plan that you're seeing negative effects or positive effects. On these quality units. That's where we get the passion. Yeah. Yeah. And then you're dealing with the last three years have been really good.

So you've got a good, in three years, you've got a really good up and coming group that needs another couple of years to be really good. But if you crank the tags to it, lower the buck to doe ratio expectations. Then they're never going to be to five or six. And then that's where the passion is. We're just starting to see an uptick. They're dead in the back of a truck as a three or four year old now. But hey, at least a bobcat didn't get them. Well, that's not a way you manage. Okay. Well, anyway, that's what they're touting. What else, Pollock? Throw it in there. That's pretty much what I've got. So, yeah, potentially if a buck can survive to make it here in like two to three years, some of these fawns that have been born on these really good years, they've had good wet springs and stuff. They could reach that full potential.

And if you get a good moisture year mixed in with that fawn being born and getting to an age, we could see all of a sudden. Jeez, they can't. But I think 200 inches. My biggest complaint with the reduction in limited entry and premium limited entry, and I know everybody, oh, you need more opportunity to people get the chance to hunt these point creeps. Terrible. Okay. We've said this before, but there's like 1,500 limited entry deer tags in the state, roughly, plus or minus. I mean, plus or minus a couple hundred. This one is. All right? By you reducing this, how much higher is that really going to go? Yeah. 20 to 30%. 20 to 30%. Okay. But the impact for everybody then of the maybe 1,700, 1,800 tags now, everybody's like, oh. Everybody had a less explicit of an experience. That's not what I wanted. That's not as good as I wanted to be.

It wasn't worth my 20-something years because you knocked it down a little bit. And these are units that, remember, we're okay with, quote, wasting a few deer on a somewhat primitive entry. We're okay waiting for 20 years because we have the general to fall back. Yeah. We can, quote, waste a few years on the Henrys or Ponce or some of these others or, you know, Oak Creek or San Juan. We need something like that. We have the general to, you know, maximize opportunity. So that's the thing. I mean, the general is what it is. I mean, we all wish it was maybe stayed the way it was, at least in this office. But the limited entry, I mean, why do we have to knock down that for such little gain? If you look at the tens of thousands of people applying for deer, it's not going to help. And you and I could say, what do we care? Not going to draw. I'm going to draw one.

Adam, you and I have, I guess I should say hi. We're speaking for. I have. I'm speaking for me. I have one coming. You get one tag in every 20 years. And I have one coming. So it's not like we. I can choose one right now that I would draw or 10 or whatever. I've got an opportunity coming. So it's not self-serving. And then I'm not going to have another opportunity. Yeah. It's for everybody, whether it be people you go with, your family, whoever that are putting in for deer. You just, we went through the same thing on the elk plan, you know, a handful of years back, right? When they decided to change some stuff and, you know, increase tax in general. Instead of having a global change, we did little incremental changes at the mid, you know, the mid rifle and a few little things. Late season archery and all those things. Trying a few things without ruining the whole plan, right? Yeah.

That current plan. Maybe it won't have much of an impact, but it's flat out said that they're wanting to issue more tags. That's why this is being proposed. And that's the tough part is everybody, they want the type of limited entry experience that guys are currently getting right now that's taking 20 to 25 years to draw. And to have more people get that same experience by drawing, but that's not going to stay. But they want that experience, but they only want it to take 10 years to draw. But they don't understand you're not going to have that 25-year experience if you draw on 10 years. It's not going to happen. It's going to be close. So then when you draw it at 10, you're going to be like, oh, that was terrible. Well, that wasn't. But you got your tag at 10, so congratulations. When some people want to combine the point systems for general and limited entry and just

call it all limited entry and make it all general type quality. Yeah. I mean, you know, really, if that's where we're going with it, you want to lessen the quality experience, but let everybody go hunt. There's other problems with that. You've got the elk people now. They're locked into elk, and then they always do the general deer. What are you going to do for them? Yeah. And antelope people, which is very few, but elk is a lot. Anyway, let's move on. So anyway, let's move on to dedicated hunter versus general. How about that? Okay. What's your guys' opinion? Before, we could apply for dedicated hunter points, general points, get a point for both, as well as a limited entry deer or one of the other limited entry species as a resident. It doesn't matter to you. Nobody cares. I mean, it's not a big deal. It sucks. Personally, it just sucks. I don't know that the system was broken.

That was my thing. It wasn't. It wasn't. I get kind of tired of just hearing this fairness thing so much. And that's all it was out of was because there's too many guys in one system or another, and they're getting to do this. It's not fair, so we need to change it. That was the only reason why. So now you have to either apply general season or dedicated. You can't do both. And before, you could do both. And it's been nice. I'm not going to lie. It's been great. I've been able to build some general season points while applying for dedicated hunter and drawing a dedicated thing. Everybody has. And so, but now it's going to keep me out of one pool or another. So there will be a snot-nosed 12-year-old that will get my general season tag. John, what do you think about that? Ooh, I like it. John, why don't you go ahead and get a word in edgewise. Talk into the mic. I don't know the word.

Hurry up. We only got an hour, boss. John, I mean, devil's advocate, you know, gets some negative comments. Yeah, but you, I think most of your comments we're doing with, like, once in a lifetime. Yes. Not general. Yeah, this, I'm fine. It's like, I just don't understand, though. It's the same system for everyone. So why is it unfair? Why don't you play? Why do you play the game? Yeah, why don't you do? You play the same game. Yeah. If it's not fair, you do the other one, too. I don't know what to tell you. Yeah. Jump in and play the game. What I hate is people that whine that they're only going to get one general tag every five years or three for the rest of their life when they're also currently in a dedicated hunter program getting three tags right off the bat. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, what are we complaining about? Yeah. It's not that bad. No. You know?

It's not as bad as you're trying to paint it. As far as getting tags. You need to have to change that program. And it's, yeah, it's another way for you. Yes, it takes an extra point, but it's another way for you to continue to apply for limited entry. And okay, I didn't draw a pond scout this year, but I do get a general or a cad do. I'm a dedicated. Like, there's other options. So you can still hunt fairly regularly. Yes. While waiting for a limited entry tag. Yeah. So it just decreases that. It's going to do what they want. It's going to make people choose one way or the other. But if you think about it, you talk between the SKUs and the processes. In five years, I want to have a really good podcast about what this has done to the limited entry and premium limited entry hunts. Oh, whatever. Trust me. What we feel about those. And we're going to have an aggressive podcast.

Let's look at this stuff on the general. How much more you've hunted on the general or dedicated because we've got this change. Well, and you never know with a new director coming in Utah. You just never know. All this could change. I mean, who knows where all this is at? They're slated for a three-year mid-review plan. It's like a six-year plan that they voted in. Yeah, but then I also saw where it was a four-year. Maybe that was on the study portion. Yeah, it was kind of different. They say there's a midway through plan. And I guarantee you, even by the third year, it'll be funny, the changes that are going to have to happen. I just want to know who's going to write the report of what the study produced. Like, what is this going to look like? Well, we kept giving tags, and we don't. We're inconclusive.

Well, we had a couple of dry years and a wet year in between. We're not sure if the weather had more to do with it than the tag cuts or the weapon reference. We knew there was going to be an uptick. We haven't had a win or loss in X. I mean, pretty fun. Pretty fun. Whatever. Whatever. Yeah, that's why I'm at. Whatever. It's all good. Give me a slingshot. I'll still go hunt deer. Come on. Just got to be a part of the process. All right. So, moving right along. What are we going to talk about next? Well, you guys had a couple of hunts we haven't even talked about yet. Pollock had one. But this was so long ago, it feels like we had to have talked about this. But apparently we have. It feels like this was happening in 1953. This was one of your 14 elk hunts that you had this year. It felt like. I know you didn't have 14. But, like, it was the year of the wapiti for the Viking clan. I mean.

Do you guys like elk meat? Not this much. Not two big, big ruddy bulls. He likes good elk sausage. Yeah. I literally don't. He's got 600 pounds of it right now. That one bull. It's all ground. Nothing else. Is it straight up ground? It's all just ground because it's going to be spaghetti. Utah women can do anything that you want with ground beef. Ground meat, ground beef, ground water. Bottled it. Oh, no. Jerk it. I hate bottled it. So, Logan was raised on bottled meat. I was, too. I'm a big fan of bottled meat. It's good. What's wrong with it? It's the texture. Add a little mayo to it. It's just like tuna fish. Add a little mayo and pickles. Yeah, tuna fish. That's right. They like it. It is like tuna fish. Beaver County, they like bottled meat. You can eat it without teeth. That's the meat.

You just put it in your mouth, swish it around until it dissolves. Yeah, they swish it around until it dissolves and you swallow. That's why they like bottled meat. Come on. Hey, I just feel like we have to give a disclaimer. Jason, you have roots there. I don't. It is actually. I don't, but I don't have anything against Beaver County. It's the Lord's country over there. It is. It is. Okay, I'm going to pry it. In what regard? Like, what do you mean? Who, who, where else in the country does more with less? We're talking general deer. There's what? How many tags? Yeah. 300, 200. 10,000? Okay. I don't know. I thought you were talking about some pretty nice bucks. I'm just saying. I thought we were talking about IQs for a minute. I didn't know what we were talking about. Follow it. Scratch that. Follow it. Yeah, look. If I'm going to war, I want those guys on my side. No. Okay.

This sounds like. Do I need to say anything else? Are you running for county commissioner now? You're actually like, you're looking for votes. I do have to say. What do we not know yet? There was a plus one point in my book when Paul showed up at the RAC meeting and made some sense. Well, what he said was. What Paul said. This is Loggie Bear's freaking dad. Okay. But what he said, and a lifetime friend of ours and whatnot. But what he said was basically, and you guys correct me if I'm wrong, but basically, I make my living dealing with data, and I know for a fact you can manipulate data to say what you want. Absolutely. Is that what he said? Yeah. Yeah. And we've seen it, and I guess it's just hard to watch it because you can say, this is what the data says, but yeah, but we could throw in a buck to do ratio off the ponds, and that

would make it look like, and then it crosshatches over here, or whatever, right, on this graph. I'm just saying. I'm just saying.

I'm just giving a new example, for instance. If you mislabel the header, the beaver in a ponds, and then they're pretty much the same thing. And it was too late to change it. And so then you got misinformation, but it was just too late to tell you you were misinformed. Gotta go through the RAC process again. Yeah. And here we are. But now we're in a Trump era. We're going to say it the way it is, and we're not going to live in fear anymore. Before, we were living in fear. No.

All right. Hey, do you not feel better? Hey, when I walk downtown, when I walk, hold on. You need to talk to Jenna about why he's drinking. When I walk downtown, my chest is puffed out this much further. We're in a Trump era. Hey. Yeah, of course. You're a person now. Absolutely. Before, we were browbeat. Couldn't say anything. I was a person. How do you really feel? I was a person. That's making me wonder if I was a he, she, it, they. That's my point. What am I? You tell me what I am. There are most people. I had a dog. Tell me what I am. I had a cat and a dog. And a litter box. In the schools. That's right. Tails. I'm done with that. We're done with that here. I love it. All right. Freaking boys and girls.

All right. Move along, Pollock. You had this elk hunt. Produced lots of ground meat. Yeah. We can make tacos and enchiladas. This is the second one. So after he got done with the one which he's talked about, the Utah Bowl. Now we went to? New Mexico. Yeah. The Fire Valley. A week. A week later, I think it was. Yeah. Clean up. Right after three weeks in Alaska, a week in Utah, and another week in New Mexico there. But you did. You were pretty smart about this. You invited the whole family. Yeah. This was not. Honey, I'm leaving again. I got to go again. Could you imagine? Okay, Logie Bear, you can get your dig in if you're fast enough. And I'm not sure you are, actually. It has nothing to do with IQs. You just can't beat a Pollock. Or his brothers. Okay. But could you imagine what it's like in their camp? In what regard? You got the Pollock clan. In what regard?

They got electric bikes, a freaking, you know. What else did you take, Pollock? I didn't even turn that thing off. Didn't use them. I took it, but I didn't even turn it off. Of course you took it. What else did you take? Just normal wall tents and sleeping bags. Yeah, exactly. Food and coolers of food. So funny. Lots of optics. Yeah. I don't know if we looked up your odds. You remember one, seven, eight hundred? What were they? It was like eight hundred and fifty, I think, or something like that. It's unbelievable. You got to have a name in the hat. That's what I think is, you know, Bronson, you and I have touted like our personal application strategies last month, this upcoming month, and things like that. And it does resonate that you have to have a name in the hat. You ain't going to get it if you don't have a name in the hat, right? No matter what the odds are. And here you proved it.

Yeah. Basically, sheep odds or whatever. The one non-resident, one non-resident, non-guided. Unguided. Yeah. Yeah. It was pretty, I mean, most of the time you would say it was a dumb choice to even do it. Well, you get three to play with down there. So you can do two dumb ones and a better thought out. I mean, I thought, I didn't, I mean, I thought maybe, yeah. Usually for elk, I do archery. Maybe Beaver County RQ came into play there. Penguich, let's call it Penguich RQ. Yeah. Yeah. And it worked, as you can see. But yeah, I mean, when I was doing my application, obviously we were in Alaska for the, during where the archery seasons would be. So usually that's what I apply for over there. The odds are a little bit better. I mean, from 1% to 6%, whatever, but there are better odds over there. So usually that's what I would do. Alaska, you brought up Alaska. How'd that treat you? Good.

Really good. Got to spend a lot of close time.

The wound is healed. I don't know. He keeps bringing it up. I spend a lot of good time with my buddies, biscuits and gravy. Really? Did they make biscuits and gravy? Devin White? That's all White ate. Come on. That and Stroganoff. Those breakfasts? So this is what's funny. Let's just deviate for a minute because he's not here. No wonder he had problems. Remember the one Alaska trip when all he talked about was he ate Snickers? Well, it was Snickers and what else? Was there any? Oreos. That was it. He blew through the Oreos too early the last time. Yeah, but when he was on his sheep hunt and he killed that ram, he said, straight up, I live off Snickers. And it does. They do satisfy. Oh, yeah. All right. Keep going. But, yeah. No, so I put this rifle hunt. The last thing I thought about even, it's kind of one of those options you put down

and then you walk away from and never even think about. And New Mexico wasn't a place I was even considering hunting. But we apply there. You know, it's all random draw and so you apply there and just, you know, sometimes shoot for the stars. And I usually always do that on my first choice. Something that I'm like, if I'm going to draw something as a first choice, if I happen to get a really low number, I'm going to make it something that's one of the better tags in the state. So, but it was, it's weird. So, I don't even care saying it. It was the Vias Caldera. Yeah. We're in six feet. Sure. Never going to try it again, I'm sure. You're not keeping that thing a secret. But it's also, there's some very unique stuff with that hunt that was unlike anything else I'd ever really dealt with. Like what? It's just. No. The big muleys? What? No, you just mean the restrictions, right?

It's a national park for basically. Oh, for crying out loud. And how can you hunt elk but not the deer? Did you ever get to the bottom of that? No. Well, they, so it used to be a private ranch. It used to be, I want to say it was like the Baca Ranch a long, long time ago. It was probably when you were in diapers. Yeah. Adam and I were out, but you were in. I was in those until I was 12. I'm in a penguin. Logan was a twinkle in someone's eye. Not even a twinkle. I still occasionally wet the bed. Fun fact, I didn't say my first word until I was three. Really? Yeah. I didn't speak. After this podcast, I find that hard to break. Yeah. Okay, well, I'm just saying. He came out of the womb with a definitive answer, a plan. And my dad told my mom by the time he's 20, he's going to speak. Don't worry about it. I can verify that. That's true. You're making up for lost time. For crap sakes.

Keep going, Bob. But it's a unique hunt. So yeah, the National Park Service actually runs the property that's held within that unit. So after I drew, I got a big, huge packet in the mail where I had to go and I had to fill some information out. I had to get some like backcountry passes and things like that. The most controlled hunt on planet Earth. Yeah, like I had to get some- You couldn't even go through the gate until a certain day. No. You had to wear orange, didn't you? Yeah. What else? Orange? We all had to wear, everybody in our whole party had to wear, you had to wear like a vest and a shirt and a hat. You need to be safe. Something. You need to be safe. Yep. Well, you don't have to do that anywhere in New Mexico. I know. I'm just saying. I know. I know. But they just want you safe. Yeah. Yes. And so it was just strange. I got this big packet.

You have to go through an orientation and stuff. I got, yeah, anyway, fill some stuff out. You have to fill out a backcountry pass.

Vehicle access. Yeah, pretty well. There's only like, I would say one road through the middle of it. Yeah. So there's like- The main vein. Like right off the highway, there's a gate. No-go zone right there. There's a gate right there. That gate, it's the weirdest thing. Most national parks, they have entrance stations, but they're never closed. They're always open. That one is. It seems like. That one is. I know. I drove by on my muzzler deer hunt. Yeah. And the hours are nine o'clock to five o'clock. They close it. And you better be out. Yeah. Oh, yeah. They will give you a ticket. Well, it's not even enough time to get started. And yeah, it was the weirdest thing. So there's absolutely basically zero scouting you can do. I had some good friends that gave me some tips and some pointers to there. Tips and tricks. And got me started on where to go.

But it's really, you're just kind of starting blind. So long story short, I went out a few days early by myself, set up camp there, just actually found a great spot right across the highway. There was a little, kind of a little knoll up on there. And I camped up on there. And I could actually walk out and glass into the caldera from where my camp was. When they're out in these wide open flashes, right? Yeah. And there's thousands. I mean, it's. Did you hear some bugling? Oh, all day. Every day. All night. To find some sheds? Never stopped. What did you do with those sheds? You're not supposed to pick those up. We left them there. Those are. They're all still there. Those are protected wildlife. They were chipped. They were all still there. But. So you have to go there the day before your hunt. You do get. You go through this orientation course. They have you come in there. You can take.

There's some pretty weird restrictions. You can only have one vehicle with a hunter. And that vehicle can only hold as many. Or you can only have as many hunters as that vehicle will hold. So essentially. What does me. So if you brought an eight passenger van. Correct me if I'm wrong. That would be seatbelts. You didn't look at the seatbelts. You didn't put in five. You put in eight. Whoever can fit in here. Well no. So they. Women and children on the floorboards. By the time we had. By the time we got there. They'd actually. They allowed. It's so different. It's weird. It seems like from year to year. This year. They allowed you to have a second vehicle. That was kind of like a support vehicle. Recovery. That could come. Toe straps. Yeah. So there was two of us. Like I went in. And then my dad was there. So he had a couple. Like I said. I took all my kids. Other than my youngest.

Probably did the whole Pollock routine. Drop some off. Go take the same vehicle out. Bring the same vehicle back in. Drop some more out. No. We could both go in there. Did your wife go down? I don't remember. Yep. Oh nice. My wife was down there. Wall tentative. Right? Yeah. Uh huh. Yep. We had a couple wall tents. So we went down there. They came and met me after I'd been down there. I tried to do as much scouting as I could. Most of it was just glassing from the highway. And because by the time you'd get in there at nine o'clock. Basically those elk all come down to these big meadows at night. And then they leave in the mornings. Some of them actually stay in there all day long. In this one section. And they just stay. But there's portions that you can't hunt. So they send you a map. And there's this portion. There's kind of like a visitor center.

And some cabins that you can't hunt around. Don't want you to be in by. Yeah. Because at this very exact same time. There was like this. I can't remember what it was called. It was a festival of some sort. That there was an extra three to four hundred people in the park. All driving Subarus. And there to like stargaze. Look at birds. All this kind of stuff. Bumblebees. I'm like of all the weekends that you would choose. Like the first rifle hunt. This has to be right now. Why would you hold it that weekend? The only tender mercy to that was the evenings. They actually. There was two gates. So you could go into the main gate right off the highway. Go down to like the visitor center. And then their housing. But there was a gate there that you couldn't be on beyond that after five o'clock. And that's primarily where you would want to be hunting behind that gate.

But at least you could kind of go in and out a little bit. So that was nice. I did. I had. You had to wait till nine o'clock in the morning. But I could stay in there at least till dark and get closer to glassing. I was glassing five miles instead of ten in the evening. So that was nice. If a guy was glassing ten miles, what would you use? I mean. Yeah. That's like impossible, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, you could just tell there's elk and just kind of watching to see what they were doing. I just wanted to get a gauge of what type of bull, what size of bull, you know, to see. There's a million elk in there, it feels like. Too many elk. Too many elk. Less elk, you might actually have a little better quality. And not that you had bad quality. Yeah. I mean, solid. But just densities are off. Yeah, there's so many. To the point, it makes it hard to hunt.

Because there's so many bugles and so many elk. You don't know at what point there's bugles over here. Do you spend time waiting to get a look at that bull, to move on to look at the bulls above? Or do you just keep walking and seeing whatever you can see on the bulls above? Yeah, it's hard. So just try to cover as much country as you can. So I went through my orientation. The night before the hunt, they actually allow you to, you can stay in there. There's hours for hunters. So they give you a code to those gates at that point. Then the hours are four o'clock in the morning until nine o'clock at night. So you can go in there early and come out late. What if you shoot one at dusk? I'll tell you that part of my story. That may or may not have happened. Yeah. And so just tell us right now, were you within shooting hours? That's what I want to know. Of course, yes. You saw the pictures.

I thought it was light. Pictures don't mean nothing. John can do a lot with AI. I'm surprised they don't give you an air tag, you know, and say, here you go. Just like for us and like our lunch that we get. Here you go. Kind of like Hunger Games, and they turn you loose out there. And you get to watch the screen. Oh, Pollock, really? Yeah. Good luck getting out on time. Yeah. He's dropping into the abyss of hell. Yeah. He found the big one. So it was good. The funny part was, too, they had a whole lot of park rangers in there for law enforcement and stuff. And in this one meadow. Because you all are going to be really, you know, really a rough crowd. There was this one meadow. So many tags. Yeah. Well, that was the crazy part. There was 15 bull tags, but there was like 20 cow tags. Okay. So we got 35 people. We need 35 law enforcement officers. Yeah. That's about what it was like. Jeez.

And not one of them was from there. Of course not. They were brought in from all over the place. Oh, yeah. And so I was parked up on the road, glassy. And park rangers were just pulling cars over left and right on the oiled road. Just to give them grief. Speeding. And so on that oiled road, that's the main highway there. Yeah. One glass hour for this feller. I mean, jeez. No, like they were pulling over just anybody and everybody. Subarus. Not hunters. No. Yeah. It was. Okay. Keep in mind what town we're near. Yeah. We might be checking for some edibles and whatever else. It might be questionable. Uncomfortable? I don't know. Yeah. So the one guy, they pull this car over like right next to where I'm glassing. I kind of got uncomfortable. I was like, I'm going to walk off a little bit here because I'm like they're doing a traffic stop literally behind me as I'm glassing.

It was the weirdest thing. So as they got done. If you want to find the big ones, you need to leave the pavement. Yeah. So I walk up there and I was like, hey, curious, can you show me on this map? There's this line out through this big meadow and there was elk splitting this meadow. And I'm like, what is that line? Because there's a no shooting on this side and there's shooting on that side. What is that line? There's no fence. He's like, yeah, I don't know. But good luck because we're watching. Give her a shot. I'm like, is that there's a, I was like, there's a fence? Is it that fence that's out there? I don't know. I was like, is that, is it that road? Because the paper map they gave you didn't, it wasn't a good map either. And they're like, good luck. As he's radioing for backups. We got a live one. We got a Viking over here going anywhere he wants.

We got Hans Ratbush headed out through the flat. And so I, I, and that was, there was actually the best bowl I'd seen. Well, there was one other bowl, but the better bowl that I'd seen, one of the better bowls was right in there. And I just said, I'm not even going to mess with it. Really? It's not worth a replication in 49. I didn't even mess with it. I didn't even mess with it. Right? It's not. Yes. So I, they make more elk every day in this place. They make more elk every day. That's right. That's what you're thinking. I like it. They just don't make tags every day. Yeah. But you don't need to shoot one on the line of prison and no prison. No. Yeah. Give up five inches for that. So I did see one big bull way up in there. He was, he was at that like 11 mile, 10 mile mark way up in there. And I could just tell that he was just a big bull, but a long ways in there.

So then the hunt came around, um, opening morning, we got up really early and, and got up in there. There was some spots. Well, we, I guess we went out Friday night and just kind of hiked this. My, my brothers and I got up in there just because that was the first time you could actually get behind the gate and go do something. So we got up in there and hike just to try and scout one more time to see kind of get some country and saw some good bulls, but just, there's just a lot of like 306 points, you know, everywhere, everywhere you look. Yeah. They're all over the place and just running around and, and they're used to people. So they weren't really too scared of you per se, but they're also rutting. Like it was just, it was just, it was really strange as far as that goes. Yeah. And so, um, do you even call it fair chase? Yeah. I mean, so that next morning, what kind of park was it?

A national park? Well, it's like a preserve or something. It's not like a national park, but the national park service runs it. Makes me wonder. It's a preserve. Tomato, tomato. Good point. Good point. So we got in there that morning and, uh, we just got in and parked. We were going to hike to essentially this old road that was closed and, and, uh, we were just like, well, we're just going to start working some of that stuff. Those bulls had come off of this big ridge down into there that we'd seen the night before. So we just kind of started leapfrogging up the road and with my brothers and I, and one of them was, he went, McCody was way out ahead of us and we just were leapfrogging, trying to get, that's what we figured was going to be the best way was to try. Somebody way ahead and then we'll hunt. Yeah.

So I like had Haley and the kids with me and then Trevor was just up a little ways ahead of us. And we were just kind of leapfrogging around. And as we'd go working along lots of bugles and to the point to where, um, like I had the, the new, you know, pure binozels, 14s, and usually I keep them in my pack and you walk to a glass and get them out, put them on a tripod, but you couldn't do that because every two seconds you were getting them out. Cause all of a sudden a random elk could come walking through the trees everywhere. So we just, it was just all day long working, working, working along. Bobbleheading it through there. Yep. And it was, it was funny because we're sitting there right off this, this trail middle of the day. And I had actually hiked out to meet my dad, to grab one of my, my youngest son to bring him back in there with us. Cause he stayed with him for the morning.

And as we did, we come walking out and I've got a rifle on my shoulder. You know, I'm walking, here comes these old couples with their little walking sticks and their bucket hats, just hiking. Nature hike. Oh yeah. Yeah. We're hiking up the exact same trail and you should have seen their faces. We, your blaze orange head to toe jumpsuit. They had, I was coming up to meet my brothers and they just actually passed them. They were up just off the trail glass and, and I came around this corner and they're literally like stopped. Just looked at me. Full orange rifle on my shoulder. And they just like put their heads down and walked like around me. Don't make eye contact. Danger. Yeah. And we had some other ones. We got the Viking. After we met back up with my brothers, we were sitting there kind of just eating lunch, passing kind of a couple hours during the middle of the day.

Glassing, looking, just all sitting there. Bugling, still going on. Oh yeah. Never even quiet down. It was for a little bit. Slightly. It was kind of weird, kind of taking turns, eating glass and having a nap. Snopper. And, uh. Grabbing some sheds. Some people come up. Yeah. That happened. But as there, some people came walking around the corner. They came around the corner and they see us. The whole. Everybody in the family's laying there together. Orange. All of you, right? Yeah. All eight. Yeah. Or six. What are you? Of us? Just the pumpkin patch. The pumpkin patch, John. John, could you imagine the Pollocks laying around on the hillside? Big pumpkins. So they just. They like come around the corner and they stop. Turn around and left. Didn't even. Were they coming up the trail so they went back to their cars? Oh yeah. Your point. This is my preserve now. Wow. This is our case.

By the way, you know who Donald Trump is? And then. That's my person right there. As we were sitting there. That same group, after they left the trail, we were sitting there and there was some elk that had fed down into some timber. We were kind of hoping to be there when they started coming back out. Well, as those people stopped and went down, they just decided to like go off the trail. So then we're sitting there glassing. And they're just wandering up through. Yeah. Just freelance. Just wandering up through the timber. I don't know. And it was just, it was a weird, it was kind of a weird experience that way. Okay. So. Put some orange on. We knew, we knew there was one point, my brother had seen some, some elk. So I'd left Trevor down there to watch for those bulls. And we, me and Cody and Haley, my sons went up farther up the trail.

There was a knob that we wanted to get on where we'd seen some wallows that night where some elk could come down into. So we hiked up in there before. And it was just in the afternoon. We hiked up to get on that knob. And as soon as we got there, started seeing bulls immediately. And it was kind of a weird transition time of year. It was the 12th. Yeah. 12th of October. End of the rut. But yeah. The numbers is what created all this. They can't breed all the cows in September. They got to breed for three months down there. And the numbers, they just keep each other going like this. You know. What was this like September 25th? Oh, yeah. Probably no different. It would be, yeah. It would be an amazing, amazing archery tag in there for sure. But so as we, as we got up in there, started seeing bulls right off the bat. One of the first bulls we saw was actually the bull that I shot.

And he was by himself kind of up in this ridge, but he was just feeding along in some, in an old Aspen stand. Couldn't get the best look at him, but I could tell he had really long beams. And then. Extras? Stuff's just stacked on that beam. You know. Didn't stop at six. I like it. Didn't stop at six. It wasn't a classic six by six. And I was, and immediately, immediately I was like, okay, that's one of the biggest bulls. I'm going to get amped up. I'm like, that's one of the biggest bulls we've seen. We're going to hunt out this year, Bronson. Clean slates with nothing but six tags on their rim. I'm all in. And I was like, this was, that was by far, I was like, that was one of the biggest bulls we've seen and put together by far one of the best. So trying to get another look at him. Well, as we're doing that, two six points got up out of that timber and started chasing

this big group of cows. I mean, we're talking a hundred head of cows. Pushing them down. And then there's 15 other bulls just coming in raghorns and they're kind of moving off that ridge. Well, as they did, I was like, well, two of those six points, one of them, I was probably the second or first. I'm not sure how big of a bull he was compared to the one I shot, but I would have shot him as well. So I thought, well, and what they did. There's two in that direction now. And they were, so the bull that I'd seen, he was about three quarters of a mile away from us up on this ridge at the top. And those other bulls were coming below him, pushing cows down into those wallows. So he's probably going to come down there. Yes, that's what I was thinking. So I thought either way, I've got to get closer. And there was, there was about 500 yards in. And there was another good point to get to.

So I was just like, well, I'd shoot either one of those bulls. So we're going to get closer. So my wife and I got up, left my brother, Cody, and then my two sons, Judson Hendricks there, left them there to kind of glass for us. And we just started moving. I didn't even get a great look at that bull. I knew we had eight on one side, seven on the other, basically. Enough. That's a pretty great look. That was plenty. Yeah, that was enough. I mean, even penguins guys can count. Yeah. You know what I mean, Logan? I appreciate you helping me out. He actually had nine, didn't he? He did, yeah, I guess. He actually had nine by seven. Never mind, they can't count. Yes. A little off. Did he have nine? We got a little devil up front? Yeah, I got a devil dying on the one side. It's horrible. Hang a ring on it? Yeah. So we started moving in.

And as we started getting in there closer, we were just going along. And we get to, I don't know, 300 yards. And those two six points, I could hear one of them coming out. And the one six point that I'd said I'd shoot is standing there, 300 yards, drinking out of a wallow. And now you're like, ugh, I can't just shoot. And he looked really good at 300 yards. I was like, ugh. Especially on 14 power plus the scope or whatever. And Haley was sitting there videoing. And I was, I remember looking back at her. You got your boys here. Yeah. And I was just like, I told her, I was like, I should be shooting that bull. Like, he's by far one of the best bulls we've seen, one of the top two. I'm like, I should be shooting him. I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing. And it was just a terrible, terrible decision because I still hadn't got a look at that bull

because what had happened was as we started, right before we started to walk, he bedded down. And so there was two other little raghorns that had kind of come down below him, but he just bedded down. He was in a great spot. But I thought, well, I just got to get closer. Well, those elk were there. And then you're left with a decision because now that herd had moved between us and him. So it was like, I don't know what we do. Well, we know what you did, but how did you do it? Well, we just, we just. I don't know if we know everything. Well, I just know which bull died. So that's all I'm, that's what I'm saying. How he died may always be. The bull died. So how did you get through 200 elk for nothing? So that was the other problem was now there's 200 head of elk between us and them. So they were kind of coming, say, off the top of the ridge from our left down into the bottom.

And they were moving down. So I just kind of told her, let's just keep skirting around. Our wind was actually really good. It had kind of switched and was actually coming back down, down slope from us. So we waited, we waited for that to change a little. So the sun was just about to set. So I waited for our wind to get really good and it started moving down away from us. So what we ended up doing was kind of just skirting the edge of them to the right hand side. But as you did, we were running into elk that we weren't seeing. And, uh, and I thought if I bumped them, they're at least going to bump the correct direction that we're going to be going. So as they did, they kind of just bumped back up where they were going. But some of them broke off. And then, like you're saying, they, a little herd of cows went up right past where that bull was bent. And now he's getting up.

And so as they come. Yeah. I've already bred them. Whatever.

No, I don't know. So it was, at this point we were like 500 yards from him. So you're really, really close. Cause in the scheme of things, when you're thinking 500, you're like, I could easily shoot that far, but he's up on top of this little bench. And I still couldn't see him, still hadn't seen him, but he was up on that bench. But now those cows went past him and they're moving slowly away. So then it was, what I think is funny is the story. You think it's thicker than crap. Look at the kill photo. Yeah. Paula was talking about wide open country. So I don't know. Go ahead, Paula. I mean, that's the top of the ridge. Oh, okay. Yeah. There's still timber in the bottom. All right. All right. So as we're, as we're working up, you're just, you're trying to now catch moving elk. And in my mind, I'd already said, I'm going to be killing one of these bulls and I just bumped the six points.

So now I've got to kill this other bull. And we're, we're in there a good five miles now. And I wasn't, I wasn't getting, and you at the time, you slowly, yes, you slowly, you slowly work. And with a deadline to get out. Yeah. Right. Well, in theory, they, they told you if you, if you kill something, you text the park ranger and let them know. Really? Do you have cell service there? Well, I had my in reach. Probably on the air. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I had my in reach stuff. So your cell phones have Starlink. Starlink. You got to pack a Starlink backpack. So that's what happens, especially with elk and me. I do it once. Once you get on a bull or get going, I have a hard time. When you're in close, you have a hard time stopping. You just keep going. Just keep going. Keep going. Keep going. Yeah. And so by this point, we were going to be pushing five miles in.

And when we knew where the bull was at, I didn't want to have to try and come back and find him again the next day. Because it might have been impossible. Now you're like, we are killing. Yes. So in my, you know, I'm like, I got to kill this bull. So you're cresting. Now you just got to get close until you can see him. We keep going and going. Well, the ridge just keeps cresting. I hate how a false top. Yes. Yeah. And so we were going along. I was at about the point of puking because you're just going, going, as hiking, as fast. As fast as you can. You're racing the sun. John, he wasn't even close to coughing up blood. I probably wasn't at that point. I was getting close. But we're just moving on farther and farther up. Yeah. Cody kept on the radio. And the funny part was he kept telling me, he's right below those two pines. Well, for him, the way he was seeing. I love that.

It was like 50 yards. Two bird trees? What do you mean you can't see them? Well, it was two green trees. There's two trees right next to each other. Two birds next. There was two green trees at the top of the ridge. He's right below those. And you couldn't see. I couldn't even see the green trees. And so we just kept going up and up and up farther. And then you'd get stuck because there would be elk to the left. I'm like, I don't know if it's them or not. I can't walk. So we'd have to stop. Eagle. What's that? Pull out the... But anyway, long story short. I don't want anything to do with this place. Nor the Pollock Clan. Yeah. I mean, there are too many elk. Keep going. It's right there. Yeah. Keep going. 14 miles later. Yeah. So finally get to a point where I can actually see those green trees that I think he's talking about.

And it's about still at this point now, we'd hit that point now. They'd move 500 yards farther up. Jeez. From where he was at when we first saw him. And he was at the... He was at... It looks like at the... It's about the edge of the ridge top where it tops off behind him in that picture. So he was right there. And I had, you know, five minutes and they were going to be gone. So we're frantically trying to figure out which one was him. He's with the cows and they're doing all that. He's all hurting now. And they're just kind of... The bulls are kind of breaking them all up and they're moving out. And just happened to get a glimpse of him coming up out of the ridge. And he was noticeable or recognizable because he was the only bull like that. Oh, he stabbed. He was the only bull that had all those... No cows or cows at this point. Did he have a cow or two? Yeah. He had a couple cows. Yeah.

But he has those big long beams. So I recognized him. So I just hurried and got down prone and was just getting ready on him. Ranged him. 300. Oh, far. Oh, he was just under five. He was like 480 something. Good little boat. Yeah. Fierce 300 rum. Yeah. So I had that 300 rum. And I actually thought as I was going along, because you can see there's all these big dead timber. And it was thick. It was terrible, terrible thick timber. It's an old, old burn. You're shooting gaps. But there's all these branches sticking up. All those trees now, the branches are all up in the air. Sometimes you can't see those either. Yeah. Yeah. And he was walking quarter and going kind of quartering away from me going up. And I just, I was like, I don't know if I can get in there because most of his vitals were covered. It was hard to see his legs, but you could see torso and up. And I thought, well. Haley.

She got the 300 rum. Yeah. I got the 300 rum. Haley said send it. Woohoo. I like it. She's your spotter. She says send it. Yeah. I literally thought. Make mama proud. I literally thought I have this 300 rum and it'll shoot through that crap. Let's see what you're made of. It's the truth. Yeah. These guys, these guys poo-poo the freaking 300 rum. No, what do you mean? I have one. I like them. I mean. Paul, like you said it best. Do you shoot a 200? When you talked about that. It's the 180. Up on, I think it was the year before your brother or something. I don't remember. What was it? On the spike? I can't remember. No, my brother had that mid-season. You felt like you cut it in half. Like you broke its back. Yes. Shooting it in the chest. Yeah. Yes. I remember that call. Oh, yeah. And so that bull, he was just slowly working away from me. I got down. There was very few windows.

It was pretty open, but there was still some standing stuff, too, that I had to work through. And he just came through an opening. And I put a, not high shoulder, but a little higher up just to try and avoid some of that stuff and shot. And obviously, it's a man's gun, so. It's a Vikings gun. It ain't a need more. It takes you out of the scope for a second. But as soon as I did, I mean, it smack, you heard, I heard it smack him. And then I got back in the scope, and I couldn't find him. I'm like, what in the heck? That's the problem with the three-eater problem. Maybe the bull was laying flat. And so I couldn't find him, and I'm like, where the heck is he? And his two cows were going up. And then all of a sudden, I hear over the radio, woo-hoo. Okay. It hammered him. It dropped him. Wow. I told you. I knew it. And it didn't spine shot him. His spine was completely fine.

It was just right through the shoulders, and it just happened. That was it. It just happened. I loved that. Oh, I know. I love it. It was amazing. So everybody's going to want to know what your ammo was and things like that. 180. You're using the 180 Normas, right? Yeah, yeah. Those Norma bond strike, 180 grains. Aren't they a blue tip on them? Uh-huh. Yep. They're basically an Acubon. They're basically an Acubon. Yep. In fact, Acubon might have a case. Each company would probably fight that to the death. Copyright infringements. Yeah. Each company would probably defend their ballot, but I mean, for all of a sudden, they're bonded. Ours is bonded specially. Yeah. With a polymer tip. Yep. It's a bonded bullet, and it hammers stuff like Jason was saying. Trevor had killed that bull the year before. That's what I was remembering. And hammered him.

Just hammered him high lungs, but it broke its spine. You know? It did, actually, didn't it? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It did. We thought he had spine shot him and had to shoot him again. We got over there and he was dead. I love the words shock and awe. Yeah. Same with this one. We got over there. I was thinking I was maybe going to have to shoot him again because my brother said, he just dropped. He's laying there kicking. I think he might be spine shot so hurrying and get up in there. So we were kind of getting stuff ready to go. He was dead. Got up in there and the dust kind of eventually just settled. And yeah, he was just shooting the shoulders. So then we got the Pollock clan. Each one have their own little backpacks. Yeah. Did you get a tenderloin? Oh, yeah. We got up. So we got up there. And it's getting dark. We decided, yeah. So it's like this 9 o'clock thing's not going to happen.

Yep. So immediately. Did you have to gut him for once? Like just to let him cool out? No. No. So I sent Trevor with half the kids out the bottom to go meet my dad. With a little bit of meat or no? No. They didn't even make it up to the bull because it was a climb. Okay. It was a climb. And I knew it was going to go into the second day. So I had, you know, Cody and Judd, my oldest son, come up to them because I knew they'd be help. So they came up and hiked up to us. You figured we'll take half the night and we'll be back. We got to come back. So we ended up just quartering him and quartering him that night and hung him up. Yeah. I hate cutting animals. Yeah. It is nice. Cutting him, gutless method, perfect. It is nice. We did take some. You know, that was what's nice about New Mexico. They give you like an antler tag and a meat tag. Why don't all states do that? Yeah. It was like Nevada.

You got a taxidermy tag. Yeah. You know what I mean? Transport tag too. Yeah. Come on. Make it easy on us. Then you got taxidermy saying, well, I'm going to be, you know. Audited here. Audited here. And we need to copy your tag. Well, that was supposed to stay with the meat. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You know? So it was nice. So we hauled out some meat and antlered that night before just to save trip because you're already going. So it was then five miles out. We didn't even go back the way we did. We just five miles out. So it was about midnight. I'm calling BS. So he said, remember, five miles was all the weaving and radio talk and all. Yeah. And then you don't go straight out five miles. You're straight out three because you did the five as the curvatures. I don't know. Hey, I wasn't there. So I'm going to let him show the course. It's his story. Look at him. He's got all flustered.

We'll pull up the onyx if you want to see it. I don't care about that. I trust you. No, I don't. But the problem was some of that country. Yeah. The nice thing about it was there's logging roads, old logging roads up in there. So you just have to wait. But what it is, you know how that cat claw stuff is off those north ridges, though. You can't just dive bomb off a ridge. So you actually kind of, we had to stay on those logging roads and keep going in and out to get all the way back. But yeah, he was an awesome bull. Three 50s range, you know. Next day went and got the seven by nine. Yeah. Did you make friends with the other hunters? What else was harvested? He didn't hunt long enough. He hunted one day. Didn't even. Well, I mean. Didn't even. Sometimes people text each other. Eh, got one. He had a few naturalists he tried to encounter, but they ran from him. Yeah, exactly.

You don't know what else was killed. I don't. We did see a couple smaller six-point bulls, a couple dead cows. In the back of trucks. We talked to some cow hunters that had a cow dang near up, close to where we were at. Oh. And I was like, I don't know what you guys were doing. They'll break a jeep down in Colorado. Because we saw cows off the road, you know. Like, I don't know why you're doing that. I don't know. This sounds like an unbelievable. I've never heard a story like that. No. In terms of the number of elk you had to wade through, sift through. It sounds, it kind of sounds like that guy I talked to. Parting the sea. Wyoming for Unit 38. Did it? Archery. He said he's never on, even on video or YouTube or anything seen, heard bugling like this. Yeah. It sounds like that. Yeah. It's thousands of elk. And it's almost a problem. Yeah, the numbers have to be like. Too many elk.

Yeah, I think so. You can't. They don't kill any. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. 60 bulls a year, maybe. I don't know. Well, I just want to know. Did you waste any meat? No, I'm going to want to know that. No, he didn't. I don't know. I like it. That was the second elk he did in, what, two weeks? Mm-hmm. The second one he brought home to mama. So we were tired. She's happy with you. My kids loved it. It was fun just being there with them. And the wall tent experience. I think you even spent an extra night than maybe needed, right? Yeah. Yeah. We stayed one extra night just because they didn't want to come back. I think you're good at that, Paul. I think you're really good at that. Sometimes I hit the road too fast. Well, it was, I don't know. It was just kind of cool just to sit there and, I don't know. You know you're probably never going to be back. No. That's another thing.

And you're outside wherever you're camped. I mean, you got. And if you had a deer experience like Devin and I, you would never be back in that country. Yeah. Yeah. But, I mean, elk's a different story. Species matter. Species matter. Based on where you're at. It was awesome. So, I guess the main thing is when you go to a ply. Apply, apply, apply. Yeah. Apply, apply, apply. Swing for the fence now and then. Yes. You could have sat it out literally. You knew you were going to be hunting moose in Alaska. I mean, you didn't know you had a Utah tag yet. So, it's not like you knew your whole fall. But, I mean, it'd be easy to just say, I normally do archery. I'm just going to sit out because there's no points down there. Paul, do you feel like you killed more than you're fair sure?

Well, at the time. No. But, you know, at the time, I was kind of like, I'm. He is kind of greedy. I was like, I'm tired. I kind of want to go back to the office. It's like, John. It's all about me.

Not about the kids. You're back a day and you guys cruised off to Colorado and I was jealous. Oh, I know. It's true. It happens. It comes in waves. You had a lot of hunting. You went for five weeks straight pretty much and some of ours were broke up. The back half freaking five weeks. Yeah. So, it comes in waves. It was a great year. All right. Speaking of applying, if you guys need help, let us know. That's what we do here at Epic Outdoors. Apply, apply, apply. We have a licensed application service. And, of course, John, our favorite person, Trump, he says it best. Should we play that again right now?

I've had a lot of feedback. Oh. Positive, of course. Yeah, of course it is. Yeah. Yeah, I like it. But, anyway, you never know who's speaking. So, there you are. You kind of blew by the whiteboarding stuff. Do we want to go back to that? Did we miss something? All right. Give me my script. You never did the ads. I mean. Well, we talked about the expo at the first. No. Well, I'm trying to throw a little plug in for our licensed app service so Wyatt doesn't get mad. We are trying to make it natural, John, instead of scripted. Well, we are $50 a state, one PC, $100 for two or more. Yeah. It could be five. It's $100 in that state. $50, your kids max out at $100. What else do you want to know? Yeah, kids under 18 or $100 total, any and all, gain points for them. We help you. We help you develop your plans. John, what have I done wrong? Nice job. Nice job. I like that. 435-263-0777.

Or hit us at info at epicoutdoors.com. Go to epicoutdoors.com and you can download it in a PDF format. A fillable PDF format, John. What else? Oh, you can also buy tickets online. Go to epicoutdoors.com. You can buy tickets for our membership drive. Huh? How about that? You can even sign up. You want to sign up for $150 membership? Go on to epicoutdoors.com. Very easy to do. John, do we even have QR codes? They can scan a code, for crap sakes. Put it on our Instagram, social media. Do that. Logan, you got it? Hey. Hey. Even guys in Beaver County can do a QR code. You are smart. When he crashes tonight, he's not going to wake up for eight hours. Do not let Pollock say that you aren't smart. Pollock, have you ever done a QR code? Yes. You're stupid. I have. Never mind. Sorry. All right. Now for CVA, Bronson. Let's crank the CVA. That was yours. We sell them. I know. Epicoutdoors.com.

We sell CVA. No, just kidding. We don't. But you can call and buy one if you'd like. All right. Anybody interested in CVA? You got Acuras, the LRX, the MRX. We endorse them. They're awesome. We actually have them. Those are on our website. You're going to have to hear this really fast if you want to get one. Right here. Try to be shit. Logan's got it pulled up. We got them on our website. Acura LRXs, Optima V2 LRs, Optima V2s, you know, the MRXs. A lot of them in stock. It's a great Christmas present. It is. Walk in a bigger hustle. Christmas or New Year. You know what else is a great Christmas or say even a Valentine's Day or something? Well, Stedman's is right here, right? With that in our magazine. There's my buck. There's a silver pendant, and then my wife, you could brand it. She's wearing my buck. Right there. My favorite buck with my family. She would term it that way.

They also do, along with some custom stuff. Speaking of, John, we had a little bit of show me this morning. What? We were comparing some ivories this morning. We were comparing some ivories, too. You had a little show me. He showed me his. I showed him mine. I mean, it was pretty cool. Yeah. So anyway, you can take your elk ivory. They'll do custom work. They've also got stuff ready to go. Oh, you don't have to do anything custom. They have stuff ready to go, right, John? Well, yeah. The custom stuff takes a little bit of time, but he's got for Christmas earrings. Pretty fat stuff. If you call. What do they got? You're going to have to call pretty soon. I've got this one. The shed. Yeah. Ashley loves it. The necklace. The shed necklace. I don't have that. I do have the deer. Yep. And earrings. Earrings. I wonder if Becky would like those. Oh, yeah, she would. I don't know.

She would at least lie and say she does. If you gave them to you, they better like them. They're also his stuff both ways. It's Merry Christmas. He's a serious jeweler. They started his great-great-great-grandpa in the 1850s or whatnot. Yeah, the Walmart stuff is just gold, silver. Yeah. I mean, but so they'll do, like his earrings, they're solid sterling silver. But like that deer, so Chief, I mean, incredible detail on this little pennant. Like incredible detail. So anyway. Well, and we got a phone number we can read, but don't these guys come to the expo, John? They come to the expo as well? Yeah. Have a booth. And the phone number, give that out. It's his cell phone number. 80-801-201-5137. 801-201-5137. Yep. And by the way, when you say, oh, it's not really proper, right? It's 801-201-5137. All right. What? I don't know. John, am I missing an ad? Geez. The whiteboard is clean.

It's clean. No, I think you got them. Throw out a little plug for Logie Bear's Fund Me account. Logie Bear, Fund My Hunting account. We can throw out a plug for that. That's perfect. Develop that overnight. Yes. Get that Fund Me account up and going. Yep. We'll post it. Get you a tag bar. Do we got enough time to even talk about Colt? What I think is funny about, I just want to throw a little shout out to Logie Bear. Okay? What did I do? This kid goes on a random unit, okay, here in the middle of Utah. One day or however many days were you there? What are you talking about? The big old two hundo. Oh, oh, yeah. How many days were there there? Not very many. You're like, no, you were there like a day, day and a half. Yeah, morning. Walks away with a picture, random picture, clean it up. We're freaking looking at a two hundo. I'm like, hey, you were sandbagging on this buck.

Why do you do that? Why do you want to sandbag on this buck? Well, I didn't sandbag on the buck. I took pictures. You didn't know what you were looking at. The pictures were him. I took pictures thinking you were going to be a hero on the gram. Yes. And then? He was running. It was blurry. I said, that isn't worth anything. I didn't even get a look at him. I forgot about it. Cleaned it up. I was on my computer. I cleaned it up and I go, holy cow. Yeah. Probably added a point or two, Bronson, quite frankly. I'm not that good. It's all part of training. He probably wasn't sure if he was on a general unit or limited entry. He just wanted to make sure first before he divulged what he saw and where it was. He did a lot of research before it came out. And then it came out through the office, not even from him direct. Then he realized, okay, I can't touch that with a 10-foot pole.

Look at this buck I found over the weekend. And he's also found some stuff on general. Logan, I'm impressed. I'm super proud. Thank you. I love it. I'm getting lucky. Just keep them quiet. Yeah. All right. Okay. Do we have anything more? Let's call it a day. Let's talk about these other stories some other day. Tomorrow. We're going to do one tomorrow or the next day. We're going to have a lot of fun over Christmas. We're going to talk about deer. More stories. Reindeer are coming. We're going to talk about more bucks. I want to do more stories. Yeah, maybe that. And then maybe we also pick out some of the highlights over the course of the last bit of time and talk to some members. Maybe we call some, get some stories. I like stories. Keeps you going. Teaches you something. You know what I mean? What do you think? Bronson? Sounds good. It's been tough.

You know the one thing I want to go back to on deer management? We talked about this. Governor tags are auction tags, special tags with three, you know, for all intents and purposes, get an entire season. Some dates vary depending on the state. Several states, they haven't even killed anything or they shot a 202 buck or something, which is a great buck, but not one you can up for four or five months. Most states didn't kill, like, you know, New Mexico or Colorado or whatever. I just think it tells you, it's like Wyatt saying, he says, I don't think there's a good, a gov worthy buck, governor buck on the winter range in the entire state. I don't think there is. Of Utah. And sure enough, that's happening. Like, people are out and about. And have you heard of one? No. Isn't that crazy? Anyway, just a little something. You know, part of it is, part of it's management.

Part of it's just, you know, this down cycle we're in or whatever. Just things. Things to think about that make us realize it's not just what we're seeing, it's really what's out there. And what makes it a little bit more ironic, that and maybe the status of what the general deer hunt collectively was this year, it was very lackluster. Very, nothing to write home about. And what are we doing? Pouring tags to generals and limited entries. In theory. In theory, what? Well, do it in the name of a healthier deer herd. And it's just hard to stop. It's hard to swallow that. Well, I guess. But the one sure way, you're not going to kill a big buck if you don't have a tag. That's a good point. All right. I like it. We're ending on a good note, Bronson. More tags for everybody. Everybody, get out in the hills. If you need help, let us know. That's what we do here at Epic Outdoors, right?

That's what we do. That's right. Cut our freaking tooth on that. Amen. All right.

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