EP 338: The 2024 Utah Sportsman's Bull Elk Hunt and Getting to Know the Epic Outdoor's Draw Odds System

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Hey everybody, Jason Carter. Adam Bronson's on the road. We're going to call him in a minute, but Cash, how are you doing? Good, how are you? I'm doing good. Wyatt, you doing good? Yeah, I'm good. All right. Everybody's healthy, right? John? Yeah. Nobody's healthy. Nobody. Nobody's healthy in this office. Hey, I'm feeling fine. All right. Finally, after what, a week or two? Hey, I told the girls, if you got what I got, you'd be dead. I think it hit you the hardest. It would have killed a normal man. It did. It hit me bad. Anyway, once a year, off we go. So we'll be just fine. We're getting past it. I had to miss Sheep Show. You guys all went. How was it? Good. Good, yeah. Sheep Show was good. Good to see a lot of people, yeah. Yeah. Good to see a lot of people and talk. Good to see a lot of people. Anyway. All right. Devin, you doing good? I'm good.

Yeah. We also went to SHOT Show. How about that? We've been getting our steps in. Yeah, we've got some steps in. Maybe by Salt Lake we'll be in show shape, but I'm not too confident. That's what I thought was funny. That's what I thought was funny. Devin's like, geez, man, I'm not in show shape. What does that mean? It means your back doesn't hurt when you stand for days on there. Yeah, those were some long days of just standing. Yeah, they were. Your feet? Your feet hurt? But you always learn stuff at SHOT Show. There's some good people there, and then obviously all kinds of companies, crazy companies. Kind of like the basement gets a little stuffy down there. I like it down there. But there's some good products. We saw a lot of people. We went a full – we almost ran out of time, and we were there before it opened. Yeah. It was a good day. I had eight miles on my Apple Watch. Really?

Yep. Yeah. Eight miles? We did eight? Well, I had to run out of the truck and get some products. Oh, wait a minute, wait a minute. So my favorite thing – this is my favorite thing. John disappeared in the middle of the day for a while, and he's got four more miles than us. Yeah, and it's kind of interesting because I always feel bad when I get lost in buildings. I get lost in buildings, okay, straight up. I can't go in a square box building and make it out in the same place. And so anyway, I'm like, yeah, I kind of suck. How do I make it as a hunter and this and that? And anyway, you're kind of hard on yourself. And everybody else is silent. Yeah, yeah, that's a personal problem. John, yeah. It's true. John's like, yeah, I've got to go out to the truck. And I look at Adam and I go, I do not know how I would make it to the truck. Like I'd have to get out my Onyx, track my steps.

Hopefully there's some service within the building, figure it out, and not lead me astray. Sure enough, John calls in, phones a friend. What does he phone? Who does he phone? Paul. Paul, what was John talking about? We're just trying to find the green carpet, the magic carpet to get out of the building. Really? Yeah, if you hit the green carpet. Does that lead you to the outdoor world? Yeah. I taught John that little trick. Is that true? I didn't even know that there was a green carpet. Well, Devin taught me that there was arrows above our heads. Yeah, there was arrows. Signs everyone said bridge, and they had an arrow. Yeah, I didn't know these things. Well, how did you? You thought you could make it. I thought no big deal. You were so confident. You were like, Jason, you're an idiot, and this graphic designer's headed out. John said, I won't get lost.

In the past, I've been the one that's had the map, but Josh kind of downloaded it before, so we've been relying on Josh, and I thought, I'll just download the map. Okay, and in the past, when you were in charge, it seems like we went round and round and round. I think we hit like 14 miles. I think we did 14 miles. We did 14 miles, and we saw the Aguila booth and 14 others over and over and over. Yes, this is true. So I thought, I'll just download the map right when I leave the table. No big deal. Well, it was inside the building. I couldn't download the app, so I walked around and around and around, and then I called Josh. And it's not like you can go from point A to point B. What did he say? Look for the green carpet. Yes. Did you find the green carpet? Yeah. Where did it lead you? It lead me to the bridge to the outside. And then once you get to the bridge.

But then you can't just go straight. Yeah. You know, they have doors closed and things, so you have to go around where it's open, and so it adds, you know, a mile.

Then you were at the truck, eh? And then I'm at the truck, yeah. You made it. Made it. Then what? Then I was running. Were you late for meetings? Oh, did you run? Yeah. Jeez. But then I, anyway, got to the meeting, and anyway, then I had to wait anyway, so. The last time I ran was in Mexico, and it was after a deer. And everybody's like, I'm like, we have to run to this rise. Like, we have to run, you know? And we were kind of like, everybody, you know, grown men, they look at each other like, we really running? Yeah, we ran. We ran. That was the last time. I don't think I'm not running. Do you run, Wyatt? I don't. Wyatt high steps. Yeah. I've never seen it, but these two have seen it, and they say it's impressive. Does he high step? When Wyatt gets somewhere, he's. He moves? It's like, you know, those people that go to the mall before it opens, and they high step a couple of times.

Black Friday? Oh.

It puts them to shame. Jeez. I never knew you were a high stepper. Yeah, either did I. I'm buying things out every day. Yeah, every day. Every day. Third gear, and Wyatt's going, man. He's making it. Yeah. All right. Okay, what about you, Josh? Last time you ran, when was that?

I don't know. Not too long ago. I used to run, surprisingly enough. I ran a half marathon a few years ago. Come on. Good. 2016, when I had my elk tag that year. Did you run the whole way? Yeah. Come on. 13.2 or 1 or whatever it is. What? Yes. The Bryce Canyon one. Bryce Canyon, clear to Cannonville. That's high elevation as well. I'll do it again. Was it? I'll do it this summer. Yeah. Do you want me to? Yeah. Okay. Done. I'll sign up right now. You're sponsored by Epic. You want a hat? No.

Jeez. I think we could get some serious sponsors. Yeah. Maybe peak refuel. If I could stop and have lunch along the way. Yeah. Maybe. You know? Biscuits and gravy. Yeah. You know? Started out with peak refuel. We could probably taste it twice by the end of it. Yeah. I like it. Yeah. Okay. Cash, you in? I'm in. Count me. I'll do it. You guys. Wait. Someone else is doing it. I'll do it. Nobody will do it. Arch is doing this. You guys disgust me. Yeah. That's what I was going to say. Arch has no friends on the Tough Mudder. No. I'm going alone this year. He's going to spark. And you guys are like, yo, I'll do a half marathon just right here right now after I've asked you to come with me. Hey, you have never asked me once to come do that with you. I would do it. But Arch, you've got some janky stories in the middle of that. That's true.

Stories that people might have to split their assets over. You just go run on concrete with the rest of the world. I'll be doing something fun. You might traumatize a guy what you've been through. What do you mean?

Hey. People want all their assets, not half of them.

I can't get coughing or I'll freaking... Anyway. Just getting over being sick. But hey. All right. So right now, we don't have Bronson in the room, but we're going to get him on the phone. He's down in southern New Mexico. He's getting ready to do Oryx. Of course, there's now a military maneuver that seems to have never happened. Never happens. Happens to happen to him. Otherwise, he'd be smashing one a day. But anyway, he's laying around the motel room. We'll see what he's got to say. And I don't know. I thought maybe he'd lose a spare tire last night. I missed all this. This is news to me. What do you mean? I haven't been in the loop on this. What's going on here? He's hunting Oryx. No. Yeah. But this whole military thing? Well, just, you know, it starts today, but it's going to, you know, they've got... Trump's in office and we're doing things. Okay. Testing some bombs. Yeah.

I'm out on that. Okay. He's good with it. I mean, anytime, you know, if Biden was in office and it was taking a day of your hunt, you'd be like, really? What are we practicing for? But when Trump's in office, something's going down. We're proud of it. We're three days in. We don't know what's going to happen. We have no idea. Yeah. It's crazy. By the way, we could go crazy right now. It is crazy. He's signing stuff. Pollock, quick story. Quick story on what your brother saw. Oh, no. Okay. Never mind. Probably should. That's classified. No, I just... No, I just don't... Let's just say there's some government streamlining going on. Yes. Right? Yes. And it's significant. We don't have to cut that, right? No. There's some government streamlining and we're seeing it at our level here within our state. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Sorry. I just don't know what I should or should not say. Within three days.

Yeah. That's what I like. It's amazing. Just the opinion. You know what I mean? Like before you're all, you know, tippy-toeing around certain subjects to deal with sexual preferences and things. Now it's like... And you feel like you might get in trouble for whatever, saying something dumb. Some significant changes with all the DEI stuff. Yes. And all the trainings you have to take and mandatory stuff. And now no training. It's going away. Making your life much better. We're going to find out if Bob Bizarre was telling the truth, Wyatt. Probably eventually. Yeah. I think he's full of it. Devin's like... He idolizes this guy. Let's see them aliens. Let's see. Oh, the aliens. Okay. Oh, jeez. I don't know. I don't know if I want to see that kind of stuff. I don't know if I want to see that kind of stuff. I think I'm with you. Some things you just... Some things better.

We don't need to know everything. We have nine. Adam might see some of that stuff this week. He might. New Mexico down there. He could. He might. That desert. High sightings. There's some weird stuff that goes on. I saw a reel this morning talking about a transformer from China that they seized at one of the ports or something. I don't know what that is, but they've heard of this. They stopped a transformer that had come into the country from China. That would do that normally. They're bugged. Yeah. Some sort of a robot of some kind that does something to watch it, whatever. I don't know. I've seen the movies. Maybe they're trying to kill us. I don't know. But then they said there was at that time 300 of them or something. But the very first day, and Trump's signed a bill or whatever that said to stop this, to stop these transformers coming into our country.

And the first day Biden was in office, he signed a paper to do away with that. And now there's now 400 and almost 500 of them in our country. Isn't that wild? Mass deportation. Mass deportation of transformers. Drones and balloons. Well, where do you think we get all our equipment for the towers that run our cell phone service? I don't know. I literally don't know. China. China. So we need China. I want to be able to call you, Devin. Yeah. We build our own. Yeah, exactly. There's no bugs in them. How about that? I get it. I'm with you. I'm with you. Well, and we saw a lot of people from China at the SHOT Show. I mean, there was, you know. One lady knew Adam. We need to ask him about that. I know you. And he's like, I think I know you.

You look familiar. She was 100% certain. Well, I think that's just. I think that was a sales pitch. You need to come in our booth. We need to take a picture, send it to the homeland, and tell them we're doing work. Yeah. We're not just here in Vegas on a vacation. I know you. Come here. Okay. Let's give him a holler and see how he's doing down there. Let's see if he's had some biscuits and gravy.

What are you guys doing today? Just checking on you. Making sure you made it through the night. Everything's safe in southern New Mexico. As far as I know, the tires all have air in them, and we're all good to go. You still have the spare. Nobody's got the cooler from the back. You're good? Yep. We're good. Right on. You sound a little bit under the weather. How are you doing? Well, I've been, you know, fighting crud for a week or so. But, yeah. Yeah. I guess. I think it's on the downhill slide. You're getting it? You've turned a corner? I think so. Yeah. You've been there. I think a while. I think you gave it to me, but I'm getting over it pretty quick. Oh, come on. Come on. It's brutal. It's brutal. I don't know where I got it. I'm going to do swab testing to find out. Oh. I'm glad to submit, because my shirt off is about 18 inches from you. Oh. It's brutal. Well, anyway, so, all right.

We kind of teed it up. You're down there getting ready to hunt. But, of course, we've got some Trump maneuvers going on that are going to delay you for a second. Well, maybe give us a quick update. Yeah. I'm not sure. Just submission. They just said, due to submissions, they're going to have to postpone the check-in until this afternoon. So, which I guess you just, you know, going into this deal down here, it's on a, you know, military installation. Yeah. White sands misarranged. Yeah. So, kind of know that going in. Fortunately, there's, you know, plenty of orcs. So, the weather looks good the next couple of days. It was cold today. It was like in the teens down here today. It was crazy. Oh, come on. Wow. Yeah. Wow. So, it's supposed to be nice the next, nicer the next couple of days.

But, yeah, we're going to find out here pretty soon whether my associations with any of you guys are going to stop me from getting in this place.

I would worry about Devin. I probably wouldn't drop Devin's name. Yeah. I don't know. I'm just, I'm not going to mention any of y'all's name. I'm just going to say, you know, me and my daughter are just looking for a good, you know, father-daughter experience here. I'm wishing for the best. Will you let us in, please? That's how I'm going to go. I like it. Well, good. All right. So, let's see. You guys, you've talked about it before. You guys drew a dual application. It's really tough to draw, let alone a pair of you. Yeah. I mean, I think, I don't know. I haven't applied for these very much. I think, Carter, you and I have applied a couple of times the last couple of years. But my daughter, Hallie, always thought these were kind of cool looking. You know, she sees them in the magazine and whatnot. And they are different and odd. And obviously, save you a trip to Africa to go home.

And last spring, she said, hey, I'm going to put in four of those. So, I said, well, let's just put in together. You know, it's whatever. And so, we did. We applied together. And we did our first choice for this late January hunt on Rhodes Canyon. So, we're excited about it. Oh, it's going to be great. Looking good. Yeah. Beat the odds. Not easy to draw. This is the, I guess, used our once-in-a-lifetime tag on this one. So, you can get Broken Horn or Off Range or stuff like that in the future. But hopefully, it goes well in the next couple of days. Oh, it'll go good, maybe, depending on the caliber of choice. Did they let the 6.5 Creed in? Do they let that in? Well, no, they didn't. And it's for different reasons than you might think. It's not because there's any nervousness or anything like that. It's just that they don't let you film or video out here.

And I have a feeling that you guys would make me bring home video evidence and proof if I shot something to do a one-shot kill with that. And I can't document that here. So, we got a 7 PRC and a 300 Rump. There you go. That's what we got with us. I like it. Let's hear your Oryx call. I heard they're rutting right now. Like, what? You have practice it? Is it a roar or a bugle? What do they do? No, I don't. Winnie? A Winnie? I don't know. No. You're going to learn a lot. You're going to learn a lot. Yeah, we will. We both talked about that in the long drive yesterday. It's going to be, we're both going to see our first Oryx together. Because whenever we see one, it's going to be my first and her first. And I guess, besides, hey, is that one we're going to shoot? I mean, I don't even know what we're really looking for. No. Straight black ones that aren't broke, pretty much.

We always tease that they're like horses. But really, AI says it's a type of an antelope. Yeah. Does it? Type of an antelope. Yeah. And AI's always right. I mean, they're always right. Yeah. I think, didn't Logan look that up about the group of them last week or so? Yeah. It was like, oh, the pack or something. I don't think we can trust them. I would say AI is rarely right.

Yeah. All right. Yeah. That's awesome. Looking forward to it. Should be fun. I brought a bunch of big empty coolers for this meat that's supposedly so delicious, you know, that everybody wants a piece. So, I'll bring it all home. I've heard Devin ask no more than four times. He's ready. He said that he's running low. Is it, you know? Give him the heart and the liver. Give him the heart and the liver, at least. Okay. Yeah. Miranda would eat the liver, wouldn't she? I don't think so. No? Maybe. I'll ask her. I usually leave those laying there. Organs. The innards. Organs. Yeah. Organs. Yeah. Not a huge fan. I'm not an organ person myself. Not when there's so much other good stuff to choose from. Yeah. But if somebody wants it, you better say, because, you know, it's about to be too late. Try to get him to buy that cooler down there at shot. He wouldn't do it. That big orange one.

It would have been perfect. What was that? Yeah. Well, you could do an ice bath in that. What's going on up there today? Anything in the application world that I missed? It feels like I've been, I mean, this last seven days I've driven to Sheepshow and back, Vegas and back here. Back. I'm sick of driving. Oh, yeah. Sick of driving. It feels like I'm missing something. No. I'll be done. We've been, Wyatt's been coding up. Wyatt, you've got some application deadlines coming down the pipe. Yeah, we've got Wyoming, Arizona coming up. So applications are going in. Wyoming Elk, he's going crazy on. He's telling, he's prepping me, Bronson, that come Monday you and I are strapped to the desk doing some of his work. Okay.

I look at it as our work. Epic's work. Yeah. Me and Devin got the same thing for Tuesday, I think, today, too. I did put something on my calendar. We're going to be strapped to the desk on Tuesday. What is it? What are you doing on Tuesday? Checking. We all work for Wyatt. Oh. Wyatt? Wyatt? Wyatt? I love it. Starting checks. That's right. And also, Wyatt, you've got, what, February 4th, Arizona. You're working heavy on that one. Yeah. Arizona right now. Got Wyoming next week. Yeah. Just awesome. Lots going on. A lot of stuff out there. So, Bronson, maybe talk to us a little bit about, you know, the emails you get for this particular hunt and then what's required and what you're doing today and then the maneuver that's happening, which we're proud of Trump. We're glad he's doing it, but it is cutting into your hunt for a sec.

If Biden was in office and it was cutting into your hunt, we'd be ticked. But now there's a little proud moment going on. Like, I'm waiting for Trump today. I don't really know what's the holdup today, but they just said due to admission. So, I don't know. Yeah, I like it. The base isn't clear whether that's due to Trump or not. Oh, 100% due to Trump. As far as this, you know, once you apply and draw, within it seemed like a month or so after the draw results came out last year, you receive kind of a, you know, big email information packet about things. You do have to submit a big application packet with, you know, your IDs and hunter safety and all that of both the hunters and any accompanying guests. As a guest, you can bring up to three guests, I believe it was. And so, at that time, that was clear back like last May or so.

You had to identify who you thought or might or could be bringing down. It doesn't mean they have to come, but if they weren't approved back then, you just don't throw somebody in and drive them down here now. You know, I think I did have my wife on there then because I wasn't sure then maybe she'd want to come. Yeah. It turned out she was too busy. She just said, you guys go have a good time. And so, she was on there. Then they, you know, email you back. You pay, I think it was $150 security clearance, I don't know, background check fee or just fees, whatever it was, $150 a piece. Got that back. And then, yeah, you get all kinds of emails all throughout the summer that talks about the, you know, some of the origins of where they came from, you know, when they brought them here, I think it was the 60s and 70s. I forget the exact dates now from the Kalihari Desert in Africa.

Talks about their behavior. Talks about, you know, certain different emails. Talk to you about shop placement and talk with you about, you know, have some pictures and diagrams. I'm sure they'll go over some of that today too. They go over differentiation between, you know, bulls and cows, you know, they both, they look very, very similar. Bulls just generally have a lot heavier, heavier horns throughout the horn. They don't taper quite as fast, a little bit more, I call them corrugation, a little bit more, you know, corrugation on them. But they're heavier and heavier for the period of the horn. Not quite as long. But cows, a lot longer tapering and, you know, a little bit different way they divergent at the top a little bit at times. But anyway, they both have horns. So, you know, I guess when it comes down to, you know, you're, you know, hopefully we're

able to be selective, you know, but, but they don't, it's, it's an any orcs hunt. It's not like they, you know, they have to do this for obviously for population control. There's thousands of them around, around this place. They do multiple hunts on here, you know, 60 or 70 per hunt. And of course, we all know they've, over the years, they've gotten off white sands and they have off range hunts. And there's some private ranches on, in adjacent to it, you can hunt on them too. So yeah, the emails are very informative. They go through a lot of different information, you know, just talk with you about that. Some of them have, you know, pictures and stories, you know, they're very, yeah, bring you up to speed. There's not a whole lot other than, I guess, yeah, you know, when it comes time to go looking for them, I think it's just going to be, you know, try to maybe get somewhere where

not everybody's just driving around. You're going to try to find your little pocket of them somewhere that you're not, they're not getting ran around by somebody else. I don't know how that's going to work, but it remains to be seen. But yeah, very good. The white sands and Gilbert and the guys are very, very good about telling you, you know, what to expect and has a big Q&A section on the emails, things like that. So yeah, very informative. Well, it'll be awesome. We're looking forward to seeing how you do. So today you do a check-in, right? Today you go have an orientation course of some sort. We do all that. Yeah, we do all the check-in, the background check. They check your guns and ammo and all your IDs and just, you know, everything like that. Go the ins and outs, talk to you about, you know, safety procedures out there. Don't touch stuff and find stuff.

Don't take, you know, you're not supposed to take pictures and video of that, of scenery and surroundings and all that. You know, they even encourage you to take, you know, fairly tight cropped-in photos of you and your orcs when you kill them and just all the ins and outs and don't go. And if there's closed roads and closed places, don't go there. So we get all the ins and outs there over the maps and all that, I'm sure, and then come back off and have dinner this afternoon, evening, and be reared up to go in the morning. They'll let us know what time that starts in the morning. Yeah, awesome. Okay, all right, sounds good. Well, we're going to keep cranking here at the office. We're going to, you know, under Wyatt's direction, do a few things, right? We like to tease Wyatt a little bit. But, no, we're just, you know, it's a Friday here, but we're cranking like crazy.

So, anyway, it'll be interesting. Just keep us posted and we'll do the same. Sounds good. And I guess we'll go from there. Good luck to you guys. All right, thanks a lot, guys. Take care. Talk to you later. Bye. So, anyway, pretty awesome, pretty fun. Those are kind of fun things to draw. It's like, Josh, you drew a once-in-a-lifetime type tag. It's not necessarily once-in-a-lifetime, but rare to draw. Once in a while, you know, that's why you apply in some of these states. We've got, I like all the systems. We're up against some of these changes in some of these states with, you know, everybody wanting to change and do things, and Colorado's coming up with some change. It's going to hit us here in a few years. Wyoming's considering it, things like that. And it's like, I don't know. I kind of like the way things are because all these states, you get to play each state,

and it's a little bit different game and contemplate all of those things, don't you think? Yeah, most definitely. It's just kind of cool. Every state has their own little intricacies, and it makes that state kind of a cool one to apply for or hope for a tag in. I mean, random tags are just awesome, and we all hope to hit one. And a state like New Mexico has no point system, so everything's random there. So it's always an exciting email to open up or a day to check your all results because you just never know what could happen there. Yeah, you just never know. And, like, you know, we're talking all the time. Of course, our offices are close together, cashier across the hall. But, like, you're at different point levels than Wyatt and I are. And some things I'm at a little different point level, which just means I'm old, than Wyatt or Devin or whatever.

And depending on who's drawn what and what, you know, some of the things that mattered most to us when we were young and broke, you know, we might have a little more points than other states. I think one thing we hear a lot of is I had a guy yesterday call in, and he was like, hey, I've got some points in two of these states. And, you know, you talked me through them, but now I'm looking at it. And, like, he would have, like, seven, eight points in some of these other states. And even though you think, I had a guy call in also talking about Arizona, and he's like, well, I just assumed Arizona was one of those states you'd never get. Well, okay. You could say that. You could say that Arizona is one of those states that you would never get. If you have to have the absolute best, early rifle, early muzzle, best season, best unit, yeah, you're a 30-year plan plus.

Probably not going to get it. Yeah, probably not going to get to the point where you force a draw. Probably not going to get it, even after 30 years, whatever. But you could get it year one, okay? Fast forward, let's erase that. What about all the late archeries, late rifles? Yeah, there's tons of what you call skews, just tons of options at all different point levels there. Yeah. Kind of a, I guess you could call it a bailout option if you want to apply for early hunt starting out, and then down the road when you get a dozen points or so, there's just plenty of options. Even these odd units, you and I were talking, some of these odd units, like, say, I hunted 5B north, but, you know, with my son, Sean, he'd drawn a tag. But I was glassing surrounding units, going to where in and out and going to town and doing other things and also hunting the boundaries, the borders.

Seeing, like, the giant bulls right inside our unit, but do they know where the border is, you know what I mean? Or do they go on the neighboring unit? They go on the neighboring unit. We were glassing up big bulls on the neighboring unit. I think, yeah, while maybe those units aren't known to be best in state, there's bulls on there at shoot. Lots of opportunity. Yeah, lots of opportunity. Even 6A, a unit known for the highest elk densities in the state or near, not known for the best bulls in the state, but is there bulls alive on there that every one of us at this table would shoot? Yeah. Yeah. There are, right? And same with unit 8 being tough. I mean, it about took a truck from me. You know, that's the roughest country in the world or part of it. But anyway, and has opportunity there.

It's not necessarily a once-in-a-lifetime type draw like, say, a 10 early rifle or a 9 or, you know, 23 north or south. You know? And so, anyway, I just think there's so much opportunity out there. I think you guys got to kind of ignore thinking about the once-in-a-lifetime type draws, best unit in state, best season. And there are some guys like that. I'm going to kill giant bulls, and I figure I won't draw, but it's worth a chance to have a name in the hat. And so I'm going to go with the absolute best unit, absolute best season. End of story. I'm good. If I never draw again, I'm good. I've had a lot of opportunities in my life, and I'm willing to have that chance. And you've got to at least have a name in the hat. But then there's most guys, most guys. There's a lot of units that would suffice. Yeah, if you're just looking for a good elk count, there's tons of auctions down there.

Yeah. So pretty cool. There's also some new things in Arizona. There were some new tags. Anytime there's two or more tags, it gives non-residence opportunities that happen in antelope. And there's a couple of giant bucks and some new opportunities. So change creates opportunity, and we do our best to stay on top of that. We do this 24-7. It's all we do in life. So don't have other jobs, not working for knife companies and other things. Like, we are very devoted to strictly Western Big Game consulting applications, drawing tags, lining people on hunts. Devin, you've done a lot of bookings lately of working with guys, Kansas, Iowa. Maybe integrating the applications and finding outfitters, knowing they can draw so we need to find an outfitter in advance of applying because that dictates the units and things like that.

And Wyoming elk, they have the points to draw, and they want a horseback hunt. This is what's new. This is who's doing well. This is who isn't doing well, or we can't even, we don't hear from anymore. Yeah, and it goes back to you guys. A lot of the time, they're going on those kind of hunts that check all the boxes for them before they have the points they thought they needed. Yeah. You know, it fits. And, yeah, you talk about Kansas, Iowa. That's way down the road, but you can book those early, and they're getting the right dates, the right spots. It's good. It's been busy. It's been awesome. And I think you do a great job of contacting people fast. That's what I like. Like, your desk is clear, you know, at least at the end of every day, you try to make it that way, and you treat people like they're people, not just a number. And it's not just you.

I mean, everybody that works with you on these bookings, and Adam and I, and, of course, Wyatt and you, and all of us, Josh. All the consultants are working on this. And, anyway, just doing it in a timely fashion, I think that's what we're good at. I think that's what sets us apart. So, anyway, I guess we wanted to call in and have a really cool story, sportsman's elk story here in Utah. So it's kind of fun knowing, you know, talking to a guy about the pressures of drawing some of these special tags. Josh, did you feel any pressure on your 1 in 800 or 1 in 900 type draw or whatever it was? Yeah. Yeah, you just, there's a lot of unknown, and you don't know. And you just want to make the best of it as well, but yet try and enjoy it. Like, that was kind of one of my biggest things. I was like, I'm just going to try and enjoy this hunt for what it is.

And I know it's going to be a good hunt and enjoy it. And I had the luxury of killing a bull just a couple weeks before. So, you know, rarely do you get to hunt a couple elk in a year. So you get that pressure. It's okay. I'm cold now. Yeah, like I kind of killed a good bull. And so I'm like, I'm just going to go have fun on this one. Yeah. And that changes everything. When you can change that mentality of, it's a little different. You didn't spend 40 points, 30 points, 20 points, whatever it is, right? It could be 40 is a stretch, but hey, Arizona Bison or whatever. There comes a pressure with the number of points that you have. Well, especially when you wait and you know, like say Utah elk tag, guys might only draw it once in their life. And it's a once in a lifetime thing. And so it was weird.

This time I felt very, even we were gone for a month before the hunt and all that kind of stuff. I was not, I don't know. I didn't feel worried at all. I wasn't stressed about it. Even with that one, like obviously I wanted to kill a big bull and that kind of thing. But I still was just trying to be as calm as I could. Kind of like sheep hunts up north and they say, you get what the mountain gives you. Yeah. You know, you're like, well, we'll see what the mountain gives me on this one. If we go back to the once in a lifetime thing, you're what, three once in a lifetime elk tags in Utah now?

Who else has killed a 400 elk here at the table? Nobody else. Nobody else. Yeah. Hashtag spoiled. Good grief.

Really?

I'll do your apps. Do you ever feel like... Why don't you turn them over to me? Turn your points over to me, Jason. We'll get you a tag somewhere. I'll get you a tag. We'll have some fun. You're going to have a heck of a tag. Enjoy this experience. Yeah. On a drought year. So, all right. That threw me off. All right. So, anyway, one thing, I guess, before we dive into another story, talking about Wyatt and I and Devin and Josh and Cash and all of us, John, everybody here at the table. You know, we have this... The website drawouts are amazing. And I want to go over that real quick because we use it in consulting. We use it in a lot of our... What we're doing for our clients as well as ourselves. Last night, I went through all my kids. And I got only halfway through with the number of states. But trying to update everybody's points.

And it basically gives me a spreadsheet so I can look at the options. And then I can go do minimum point queries. Of course, personally. But we're doing it all day, every day for clientele and whatnot. But, like, for example, you can go log into our website. Somehow Logan's logged in. I don't know why we gave him a membership.

What are you going to use that for, Logan? Do you use it for good things? Or what do you do? I do hunt, actually. Oh, there you go. Believe it or not. I like it. Even the geeky guys.

We need the geeky guys. They make our websites and podcasts look good and sound good. So, anyway, Logan does hunt a lot. And so it's pretty awesome. I just like to tease him. But, anyway, we go on here and we go to research tools, draw odds, Colorado minimum point search. I just love this minimum point search. Click on it. You can click on that and then click on a species. Say it's deer because it's... Right, deer are cool. Maybe the best. And so, click on that and then deer. Select a species for the minimum points that are available. And then point range. So we can just get this point range. Let's say it's... I've got to get this little Apple keyboard. I don't know. Who uses Apple? Half your company. It's kind of janky. I don't know if it's half. You guys, you got you and Logan. Let's call it you and Logan and that ain't half. Josh has one at the table. I'm a hybrid.

I'm like a black... That's a hybrid engine. I'm a black tail. Oh, jeez. Part mealy, part whiting. That's what the air gun guys were like. Hey, you need to get into air guns. And I turned to them. I'm like, okay, that's like using an electric car. Yeah, exactly. I like gas. That's cool. I like powder. All right. So anyway, you can go to five to seven. Let's just say, you know, I like... I want to know about the O2Rs. I want to know the second rifle. Second rifle is the first real rifle deer season in most cases. Five to seven points. Click on non-resident because, hey, that's what we are. And then it goes down and gives me the options. I can do a unit five. No, not a huge fan. Six. Yeah, there's some good bucks there here and there at times. Maybe in a, you know, downtrend at the moment. But anyway, unit 30 second, unit 40 second, 55 second, Gunnison, 63. Bit of private.

Probably not a huge fan there. But hey, whatever. 67 second, Gunnison, 76 second, and 79 second. Those are options right there from five to seven. Now, really, if I have seven points, my real options are zero to seven, you know. But a lot of people naturally, when they think about using points, they want to maximize their points. I want to get as close to seven. In fact, I'd like to get an eight-point unit that slipped into the seven. I mean, that's how tight people cut it. And then they just end up finding themselves continuing to chase. Never draw. So a lot of times I like to say, well, if I had seven, I'd apply for something five to six. And just make sure I go. I want to know I'm going this year. I want to be able to beat the draw and go. And so anyway, but if you did zero to seven, now I have all these options. You know, you could get into an 18. Ooh, good luck. Anyway, or a unit 20.

Or a unit 25. Ooh, you know. Put on your hiking boots there. Anyway, and so you can just kind of scroll down. And here's all of these options. 48, 49. You know, maybe some up-and-comers or whatever. 54 second. 60 second, okay. Somebody's going to have a good one on that one. But anyway, you just kind of look and you can say, yeah, these are options no matter what. And, you know, yeah, group apps. You've got to remember in Colorado, group apps, you're going in with the lowest point total. So whoever has the lowest, they're dragging you down. But, well, and that happens. But understanding these systems, I think, is imperative. And then knowing, you know, going to the website, and it's cool from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Nobody's here at the office. You still want to look around. Go look around. Go look around in all the states. These are updated. I think we just loaded Nevada.

I've got to go through and, you know, us as a team, go through and proof it a little bit and look at it and make sure everything jives. Sometimes there's some programming discrepancies and things from raw data that the state gives you. But I think, by and large, everything's loaded. And so, anyway, this works on Arizona, too. Of course, we're right in the middle of Arizona, right in the middle of Wyoming. Go back to Draws. You can click on Wyoming. You've got to hit the name.

Click right there, minimum point search. And let's say it's elk. And then let's just say I had 12 points. So I'm going to go in and do like a 7, 2, a 12. And let's just, I guess, non-resident regular. You can do both, too. Not really wanting to do that. I like to do both because then you can see what you're going to pay for and what you don't have to. So 2 grand versus, you know, 7, 800. 700 bucks, yeah. Yeah. So here's my options. I did both. Like Devin said, you know, dive into it for a whole list. A whole list right here. All the 120s, 122s, 19s, 23, 25. On down through the Bighorns and all the way up to Cody and all of the type 1s, type 2s, type 9s. And then you can click on those individually and actually see, you know, what the trend is or what actually happened. 33% with 9, 100% with 10 and above or 9 point something and above. And then 0% underneath.

And then we've got the random odds as well. So you can go look at that and check some of that out and see what you've got going. So they do a 75-25 split. And so there are random tags in some cases. Some cases when you only have less than four non-resident tags in a specific non-resident category, then there's not a random tag. And we'll put no tag in the magazine or something like that. And you'll be able to see that online as well. Wyatt or Devin, you guys have anything to add? Yeah, I'll add. The other thing I really like, if you go back to Colorado, if somebody says, you know what, I want to hunt unit. I don't care what unit. Say, just pick a unit. So like deer. Go to deer, yeah. You want to do deer. I want to hunt unit 35. Okay.

Do you? Do you really want to hunt 35? No. Yeah, I wouldn't either. But this will list every season possible and what points it takes for resident and non-resident. And so you can, I like that too. So you can go through there. So what do you like about this? Obviously, you're looking at the 01 muzzleloader. So this is the muzzleloader season, the 02R, 03R, and 04R. Yeah, this was probably a bad unit example. But you can see the point spread between archery, muzzle, even some of the point spreads between second and third rifle in some units. Yeah, there's zero to two, right? Zero to two. Oh, look at third to fourth right there. Yeah, there you go. Third to fourth, two to 15. 13 point spread. So to be the last guy, to be the last guy on the unit, you're giving up 15 points, but the last guy is hunting the rut and there's nobody on the field and everything's for sure on the winter range

and hopefully everything's visible with the snow and things like that, right? So give me a little bit better example. That's what you're looking for. You know what I mean? Like 40 or... You could go to elk. Go to elk 61. Okay. So there's elk. Scroll to 61. And with that, I like what you said about lowering your point level lower than what you have. Like if you have, say you have 23 points, don't type in 22 to 23. You really don't have a breadth of options. Right. So there's 61. You got 61 archery. Well, you got the early rifle, archery, muzzle, you know, what they call the first rifle, which doesn't include deer, and then the regular second rifle, which would be identical with deer, second, third, and fourth. And it goes through that. You're anywhere from, I mean, non-resident wise, you're anywhere from 24 to 30 points. How about that?

Residents are doing 21 and 18 for the early stuff and 10 and 11 for the late. Even a resident. Yeah. For the later stuff. Muzzle at a resident, 18 points. So then you can go click, click on the resident on a specific hunt and actually look at what that means. I'm a resident. I'm a resident. Muzzle, 18. Does that, what does that mean? I've got 17. I want to really look at how close I am. Oh, no. It was a 73% with 17. 18 was guaranteed to get in. Yeah. 100% with 18, which is why we put it initially. Oh, with 17. Okay. Well, 17, you actually had 16 last year when these odds were built. So you would look at it and say, yeah, nobody in the 16 point tier, but there's only four left in the 17 point tier. If nobody else dives in, I'm going to get it. However, obviously people come in. That 23 point guy came in or he'd have drawn last year.

The 21 point guy came in, knew, or he would have drawn last year. 20, 19. And people are coming to the realization of, I'm not going to draw a 210 or 201. And so what are my other options? Right. The other thing with looking at that table from the prior year is sometimes you'll have a five pack jump in with five more points needed and that skews everything. So you assume that's probably not going to happen again. It just kind of shows the future. I look at this all the time. I live on this. I live on it. Yeah. I literally live on it. And with the stroke of whatever, keypad and texting, we adjust this all the time. We added dates to Arizona. Wyatt and I were dealing with these dates and all these late archeries were showing up within our queries. And we're like, it'd be nice just to see those dates quick. Like, how does that only 11 points for archery? Oh, that's the November archery.

You know? And so, boom, it was done. In a matter of like five minutes, it was done and programmed. So we can make adjustments all the time. We're constantly making it work for us, which we assume the rest of the world would like to. What were you going to say, Wyatt? I was just going to say one thing. You kind of hit on it right there just for a second. But I get that question a lot when a guy calls in. He's looking at the odds. I currently have 18 points, and he's looking at 18-point draws. You've got to look the year prior. You actually had 17 points when you're looking at these odds. So that's one thing. You've got to go back a year looking at these odds a lot of times. Yep. I like it. And then there's a lot of states out there that don't have point systems. And so you go in, and it's more of a simple breakdown of, you know, it's nice when there's actual non-resident allocated tags.

Then you've got non-resident odds. Non-resident applicants, non-resident tags, very easy to compute that. You know, sometimes when we're up to 10%, like in Montana, you know, we're mixed in with residents until we meet our quota. So it's a little bit tougher. And you'll see in Montana, our odds are the most accurate out there. You've got what could happen and then what actually happened because there's a little bit of a mix there. In a lot of cases, we meet our quota. It's a lot of cases we don't meet our quota. And so what actually happened versus what statistically could happen if we still hadn't met our quota. What are your odds? Same thing with New Mexico where three choices count. Or Nevada, five choices count. But New Mexico, no point system, three choices count. Well, you've got to add all those in. But some guys may have drawn their first and weren't available,

weren't even in the draw for their second, third. So this is a worst-case scenario. This is a worst-case scenario assuming nobody drew their first or second. They were actually a valid third-choice applicant and stuff. So you can go, you know, just hit unit two, rifle, right off the bat, and you can just go, you know, just as an example. But you can do this for any species within the state of New Mexico, anything, anywhere, western, big game. We're running those odds and queries and whatnot. So this is just an addition. You have to log in to get this. This will be in the $150 membership, which you get the publication monthly December through June, bi-monthly the remaining part of the year. And so just a very – people that aren't using this, I would say are getting less than half value out of their membership. This is like – we live on this every day. I log into this when I come into work,

and I usually leave without even logging out, you know, logged in 24-7. Anything else that you can think of? Another one to touch on might be like the Arizona, if you look at like the Elk odds where residents and non-residents are all shown together. Maybe the breaking point there. So, for example, which one do you want? Go to 27 Archery or 1 Archery or just any of those health units. Just something. We'll go down to this Archery. It's kind of an alphabetical somewhat. So like a Unit 1 Archery, right? We'll just touch on that. We'll scroll down. So right at the top – All those bonus tags issued right there, but that's residents, non-residents combined right there. So it's nice we have it broke down up there in the top for this is what non-residents needed. This is what the residents needed to take this tag. Yeah, so non-residents, 21 points needed to draw.

Residents, 13 points needed to draw. And you can go here. You can go here and look right here. We click down, so we've got 1, 5, 6. And then in the 20-point tier, there was no tags issued. Clear down to the 17. Well, that means, you know, the 20, 19, 18, they were all either non-residents or this was the second choice and they'd drawn their first as a resident. So you can kind of see how that happens. And then, boom, here we come back into two residents drew in the 17.4 in the 15, 25 in the 14, and 7 in 13. And you scroll back up to the top. Residents points needed at least 13. At least 13. Not guaranteed with 13. 7 out of the 130 drew. And then you have random odds. You have the random odds in the next column. And you can see what your odds are. And they increase with the point level you're at because you have more names than that. More names than that, yep.

And so non-residents get up to half of our tags go to the max point holders and then the remaining balance goes to the random. And they did that because, you know, we're lopsided in points in certain places. Arizona strip deer. We are lopsided. We go in with the residents, 20%. We would gobble up all of our 10% non-resident quota in the max points. And so how does a guy like Cash have a name in the hat for the Arizona strip? So this allows for that. Anything to add on to that? No, that's just kind of what I wanted to touch on. That can be confusing for guys too because you see those bonus tags issued and there's two different point levels there. You can kind of see where the residents drew and the non-residents drew. So I just wanted to clarify that and show that we had it broken down there on our website for you. Yep. It's awesome. And then obviously there's some mapping things.

And then some basic information comes over from what's in the e-mag. We also have e-mags on here, electronic versions. You get that first. You can go through and peruse, kind of check out some of the states and species and whatnot. So anyway, of course, getting the paper mag too. And pretty awesome, pretty fun. All right. Okay. Moving on. Let's move on to something fun. Josh, sounds like you've got a birder that you've got to deal with here shortly. Tell us about that a little bit. Oh, just selling some optics to anybody that wants to buy them. Anybody, right? Anybody. Anybody and everybody. Lefts, rights. I got about 15 more minutes. Blues, reds. However you identify, we'll sell you an optic. All right. So let's talk to Braxton. Tell us a little bit. Key that up a little bit. Josh, you dealt with him a little bit this year. Yeah, I talked to him a little bit.

Braxton, he actually approached us at the expo last year in the booth and kind of introduced himself and said, I just drew the sportsman's elk tag. What should I do? You know, and it's like, oh, geez. So we talked to him a little bit about there. And he kind of wanted to go and try and do it by himself with just him and his buddies, you know. And so, I don't know. We had several talks about that, of the advantages of going with an outfitter and maybe the advantages of going by yourself or disadvantages and vice versa, one or the other. Just all those kind of things when you draw essentially a once-in-a-lifetime tag. Because it is that that, you know, just the mental part, a lot of times it comes with hunting and drawing a big tag. And we talked through that about a lot. And anyway, so it was cool. He killed a giant bull in the end and made it well worth it.

And he's just an average, everyday guy. When he called the office, he's just a young kid trying to start a construction company. And, I mean, just an average, everyday guy. Go get her. And wanted to try it DIY. Good kid. Yeah, crazy. It's awesome. Well, we've got these kind of tags available in a lot of states where, you know, you get a name in the hat for a governor-type tag. Extended seasons and hunt any unit and things like that. It's only a dream tag. Yeah, it's a call we all dream to get kind of deal. Yeah. Geez. You just don't get those very often. And, of course, in this particular publication, we have both the deer and the elk. It's a testament. We've got serious hunters that are members of Epic Outdoors. And we appreciate you all and learn from you all and hope to help make your hunts a success.

And so, anyway, Josh, you were pretty instrumental in a lot of that and dealt with him quite a bit. And, of course, kind of went through the good and the bad, right? It was a long, old season for him. He quit clearing into October. Yeah. So, you know, a lot of times you'd kill early and be a hero right off the bat. And this one ground out a little bit. So, anyway, let's give him a call and get it from Braxton himself.

Hello? Hey, Braxton, how are you? I'm doing good. How about yourself? Good. Hey, this is Josh and Jason, Cash, Devin, Wyatt, John. Everybody but Adam. We want to hear an elk story that's not Josh's. Yeah. Well, that's hard to beat. He happens to have a couple. And he's a storyteller, so we never know what the truth is. Yeah. Never give the full truth. So, yeah. Tell us about the tag and the pressure of getting the tag and then making good on the tag and all that went in it. But just one of those calls that we all want but then, you know, can be a love-hate deal. But then obviously ended in an absolute giant for you and just all the ups and downs and things that went into it. Yeah. All right. Well, obviously, when you draw a tag like that, I mean, it's the only one in the state. The amount of pressure you feel really does kind of take away some of the fun, right?

You get so focused on, like, oh, I got to kill the biggest bull. And if I don't, people are going to judge me and think I'm not a good hunter. Right. Braxton, how did you find out? Like, did you just check your email? Somebody, you know, how did that process go when you found out? Yeah. So, I guess I'll start from the beginning. So, obviously, that's something you won't forget. I was at work one day. I do excavation. And I was back filling a basement. And I had my little brother helping me that day. So, we quit for lunch and we go, we're at this chicken place getting some lunch. I'm like, oh, sportsman's results are in. You know, can't wait to see that I gave the state some more money this year. Open it up. I, you know, buzzed through the results. I'm like, yeah, unsuccessful again. And then I actually got out of the email and I was like, hold on a second.

Like, is my mind playing tricks on me or did I see successful somewhere in there? So, I pull it open and sure enough, it says successful sportsman's bull elk. And again, it's kind of hard to comprehend. I'm thinking, no way. Like, something's wrong. Blah, blah, blah. But sure enough, that was the case. So, I started to kind of lose it. My brother doesn't hunt. He didn't really understand, you know, what had just happened. So, I ended up making a couple phone calls. And then shortly after, I called Epic and I was like, hey, guys. I talked to Wyatt. I was like, what on earth do I do? Where do I start? And Wyatt's like, well, take a couple breaths. Like, you're going to be all right, you know. It's easy to say when you're at the desk. Yeah. No biggie. Yeah. I'd like to feel this pressure one day, though, that he was going through, you know.

I was trying to talk him off a ledge there or, you know, talk him through it. But I'd love to feel this pressure. I want somebody to talk me off the ledge one day. Yeah. Oh, yeah. It's a good ledge to be on. That's for sure. So, I mean, the rest of that day, we ended up calling it a day early because I seriously couldn't focus. I was like, dude, we're operating heavy machinery. I'm not here. Like, we got to go home. Go look for some sheds or something. Yeah. Start scouting. Yeah. Well, that's what you want to do, right? But you draw the tag in November and it's kind of painful because, I mean, you can e-scout for hours and hours. But, I mean, you can map out a unit so much until you have, you know, 50 hills you want to go check out. Yeah. So, like I said, though, I talked to Epic a handful of times before the expo.

And then I went up to the expo with really high hopes that I would get some good info. I talked to all the outfitters in the state, kind of just picking their brains a little bit. I'd always been a DIY guy. I'm a first-generation hunter in my family. My dad doesn't hunt. Grandpa's. It's all. I've kind of just figured it out by myself and I really enjoy doing that. So, that was the goal. But I thought for sure I'd need an outfitter. But at the expo, I ran into Josh and he took a lot of time to kind of explain to me what this was. And I guess I should say this, too. I'd always been a mule deer hunter. I've got points for Utah for mule deer. I have never cared about elk before. So, the elk was a total new experience to me. This is totally understandable. This is understandable to us. I don't know.

Yeah. I mean, there's something about big muleys. You eat elk and you mount the mule deer.

There you go. That's true. So, anyway, we're talking to Josh and he's like, you know, I'm 25. He's like, dude, the way that you're young, you've got time. You've got enough resources to where you should be able to go get this done on your own. And that was the first time I'd actually kind of had some hope. I was like, oh, awesome. Like, okay, great. And he was super gracious. He helped me with my e-scouting. He helped me kind of get a good idea on where to get started. Because that's another thing, right? I mean, you draw this tag and you have the entire state. Josh never has helped me like this. He's never helped me like this. Jeez. It's amazing what a good tag will do to somebody. Yeah. It's amazing. I helped everybody the same. I have equal opportunity. Was this before? This would have been before he turned into competition, right? Yeah. That's a good point. That's true.

This is a good point. Yeah. We still talked, didn't we? Turns out Josh has a tag on one of the best units in the state, too. Didn't know it yet, right? I mean, the draws hadn't come out. Yeah. It still didn't matter. Oh, I know. That's the other thing, right? I'm like, okay, great, you know? Turns out he himself pulls a tag and now I've got some more competition. I'm like, great. You know? There goes that resource. Which may or may not have been why Josh wanted you really close to the chest right there. And I just fell off the radar and quit talking to you after that, right? Oh, forget it. Oh, you were great. You were great. So, we talk. Then I was, what happened was then at that point, I was using him for info. Yeah. Because you were hunting moose. Yeah. I was in Alaska, so he was scouting for me now. Will you go check over here? What'd you find?

And I'll tell you places to go, but you have to be transparent. Tell me everything. Yeah. I like it. He's like, sign this waiver before I give you any info. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, waivers have been signed before. Right, Wai? Yeah. There have been people that have signed some documents. All right. Keep going.

So, you know, we narrow it down to a handful. I narrowed it down to two units in the state that I really wanted to hit hard. So, I started to dabble in actual scouting in late March, just kind of, you know, driving roads, getting to know stuff. And then in June is when I really started to hit it hard. Pretty much from the end of June until the hunt started in mid-August, I was out every weekend and anytime I could during the week. I think I was close to 45 or 50 days of scouting before my hunt had even started.

And it was great. I saw, dare I say, hundreds of bulls. Like, I saw tons and tons of elk. I remember the first day I went scouting, I glassed up 19 bulls of one morning. And little did I know at the time, one of them ended up being one of the biggest bulls I would see all year. But having, you know, like no elk experience, at least no big elk experience, I found it extremely difficult to judge, you know, giant bulls, right? Yeah. Because you're, I mean, I've been on numerous elk hunts, you know, I've been a part of that stuff. But there is a huge difference when you get above that 360 to 400 class. I mean, you're looking for very slight differences in time length or mass or, you know. One to two inches on each measurement is a big deal. Yeah, they add up fast. Yeah, yeah, they do. And it makes it extremely hard to be like, okay, you know, we're looking at a 385 or this is a 370.

Like, it's tough. So, I found a lot of bulls. I had a number of bulls that I wanted to, you know, pursue. But at the same time, I didn't really know what exactly they were. And you're glossing from, you know, at times miles away. You're getting the best video and pictures you can. And I had a handful of resources that I'd send them to and try to get estimates for how big the bulls were. But ultimately, it was kind of like I didn't know what I was doing. Yeah. But I knew I was finding lots of elk. You know, definitely a lot of bulls for a guy who, especially a guy who never killed something, would be stoked with. But you want to do the tag justice. Yeah. So, we hunted on the archery hunt, which my archery dates for like August 17th through the end of August or something. I don't remember. But that was mostly just more scouting.

And then September 1st came, and I made a plan to be down there from September 1st until about the 18th. So, I had a handful of buddies down there with me, and we hit it pretty dang hard for those 18 days.

So, it's kind of funny how things happen. Oh. I was just going to say, this is a pretty crucial time because you're the only man on the mountain with a rifle during the September 1 to, what, September 17th timeframe. So, you're getting ready to shoot over archers. Yeah. Exactly right. I mean, you've got the long-range rifle ready to go. Step aside. Yeah. No, it's good. So, that's why I really wanted to hit it hard. I mean, the goal was to be, you know, have a bull down within the first 17 days of September and not really have to deal with any other hunting pressure. Yeah.

So, I didn't even realize this until well after the hunt. But, we ended up finding my target bull and not realizing it was him. He was hanging out in some real thick burn. And, like I said, it wasn't until months after the hunt reviewing footage that I was like, holy cow, that was the bull we were after. Yeah. We saw him. Mm-hmm. But, it's tough. I mean, they're still bachelored up a lot that time of year. So, fast forward, did your target bull get killed or is he still walking? As far as I know, he's still walking. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. He's still alive. So, I don't know exactly what he went. But, I mean, kind of beating him up. He's 90s for sure. Okay. He was a great bull.

So, we missed that opportunity. And then, there was another bull that we ran into that I still think about to this day. We had him dead to rights at like 700 yards with no wind. I mean, but it was kind of one of those downhill, drastic downhill angles where you're kind of looking at him from on top. Kind of takes away from the mass. It makes times look a little shorter. It was really hard to judge him. So, we ended up passing on him. But, I mean, he may have been one that I probably should have taken hindsight. But, you know, that's all part of the experience. So, by the end of this 18 days or whatever, I'm, you know, spent a crazy amount of time on this tag. And I'm just burned out. I'm feeling, don't have very much hope. And I realized that I kind of needed some help. Right. So, I'd kind of been talking to Corbin Martin of Martin Hunting.

And, you know, I had mentioned to him in the past, like, hey, I may need your help later. You know, what would it be like? And the guy was awesome. We actually went scouting a handful of times together, just kind of his buddies. And, you know, he was sending me some areas to check out. And he was helping me as much as he can, right. But he's got to run his business. So, he's obviously not wanting to, you know, give away valuable bulls. Yeah. But he was helping as much as he could. So, finally, I called him. And, you know, we ended up striking a deal. And I signed with the Martin hunting crew, which was awesome. Like, Corbin and Denton and all those guys are, you know, they're right around my same age, young 30s, 20s. So, it was very similar to hunting with a lot of my buddies. But I thought that I was, like, a pretty good hunter.

And then I started hunting with these guys and was humbled, to say the least. So, we go out a handful of times and found a couple great bulls. Got on one that I thought for sure we were going to kill. He went into some thick PJs. And when we finally got close eyes on him, we realized that he had a broken second. So, we ended up passing on him.

And then fast forward to mid-October. It's actually during the mid-season rifle hunt. So, you know, there are people out there for sure. A lot of bulls by now had already been killed. Killed, broken, pressures on. You know, pressures. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I'm starting to get worried. Like, okay. A lot of bulls, especially a lot of bulls that I would have loved to put a tag on, had already been killed. Which, I hadn't really seen that many bulls get killed on the archery hunt prior to this year. So, it had me pretty worried. But we had faith. There was an area that we had had our minds on for quite some time that we wanted to check out. So, I head down. And the plan was to go backpack into this area and hunt for like three to five days. And there was a specific bull that we were hunting. And we were hoping to turn him up. And I knew if I saw him that it would be kind of a no-brainer.

So, we go scout in the morning. And didn't really have a productive morning. I could get into that. But it's just to add more length to another already long story. But not really a productive morning. And we're kind of regrouping. I'm down there with one of my best buddies, Chase. Who had taken an immense amount of time just helping me out. And he knew a lot more about elk than I did. So, it was great having him down there with me too. But we're down there. And Corbin's like, okay, well, you know, it's about nine in the morning. He's like, let's go check out this one hill before the morning kind of wraps up. And then we can backpack into the day and, you know, go spend the next tenfold days deep back in there. So, I meet up with him. We hop in the buggy. And we're going up the road to look for this bull.

And as we're going up there, Corbin looks through the pasture side right in front of me and just goes, crap, dude, there he is. And I'm looking like kind of up in the top to see where he is. I'm like, there's no elk right there. And he's like, no, you idiot. Look at the bottom. And sure enough, this bull is standing there at 150 yards just looking at us. Wow. And I'm like, what on earth? You know, you never expect to see that kind of bull, especially during the hunt right off the dang road. So, you know, we strategically, you know, kept driving. And then we crept back down the road and started looking at him. And it was kind of weird looking at a bull that big at 150 yards. I mean, even with your 10-power binos, it's almost like you're too close. And he was probably at a 35-degree angle down below us. So, again, we've kind of got a crappy vantage point.

And he ultimately didn't look as big as we thought he was or as big as we hoped he was. So, it was really weird. For the next four and a half hours, we ended up sitting on that road. The furthest he ever got out was 244 yards. And I was just having a crazy internal debate, like, is my hunt actually going to be over? You know, is this – it definitely wasn't how I pictured killing sportsman's bull. It wasn't how I would have ever thought it was going to be. And I was kind of disappointed. I like, you know, kind of a nasty – like, we're going to have a hunt, you know, not a smash and grab on the side of a road. But October, mid-October doesn't mean smash and grab. I'm just thinking you're a month and a half, two months into this. Yeah. Mid-August to mid-October. Yeah. Yeah. But you've got patience. You've got patience. And you're watching a – let's call him 3-9. What did he end up going?

Well, I'll say this. He was missing a handful of inches, but we got him at 397 and a half. Yeah. And you're praying about this decision? Mid-October? Yeah. Well, there's three, four hours all around. I mean, you're going into a fast. Spike. For four and a half hours? I mean, we're starting to not pull water, pull food. We're really getting into this. And I'm like, geez, you've got patience. You and I would not be good hunting partners. It just goes back to the pressure, right? Yeah. Like, we had ran numbers on him I don't even know how many times. And nobody was able to get him past, like, 385. Like, 385 we thought was being kind of generous. Yeah. And we had some trail camera pictures of him. And, I mean, he was a sweet bull, right? He's got his five and his six are split. Like, he's got great character. He's an awesome-looking bull. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Great time length.

I mean, a sweet bull. So, I got to the point where I was like, you know what? Like, I've got all my buddies here. I've hunted my butt off. My poor wife is just, like, sobbing every time I leave. I need to get this thing done. She's just got to toughen up a little bit. That's all. I mean, my hat's off to that lady. She's been some. She'd never experienced, you know, this kind of hunting before. So, it was kind of a zero to 100. Yeah. But, you know, ultimately we decided to take him. And, you know, 244 yards. It's like I put a bunch of money into building a gun this year and expecting long range. I'm like, I don't even need to dial for this. So, ended up killing him, you know. Just one shot, dropped him, and ended up getting up there. And the second all of us got up to him, it was like, oh, this sucker's big. He's bigger than we thought. Yeah, he's big. Yeah. So, yeah.

I mean, that was great. Like I said, he ended up at 397 and a half. I was able to have all my buddies there. And my father-in-law was able to come down and be a part of it. And it was awesome. It was truly awesome. And my hat's off to the Martin guys. They just, those guys know what they're doing. They really did make me feel like I didn't know anything. And I'd been hunting the, you know, same areas that they'd been hunting all year. And it was like, geez. Just the confidence. Yeah, the confidence of hunting it year in, year out. Many clients. And you just, it's a local knowledge kind of thing, you know. Exactly. Not that you don't have it, just they've got more of it. Oh, I mean. Of that local knowledge, you know. Yeah. That local knowledge and having grown up near there. I mean, it really is a huge difference, you know. It does make a big difference, so.

One thing about these photos is that bull's body, the antlers, I mean, it just dwarfed the body. The body looks small. That's how big this bull is. You know what I mean? Yeah. Just crazy. It's incredible. And, I mean, he wasn't the biggest bodied bull, for sure. But, I mean, he definitely wasn't small, you know. No. But, but the antlers are crazy. I mean, he's got pine length. He's got mass. He's got, I mean, just a sweet, I mean, he looked, he's a straight six, right. He's got two little, little kickers. But, I mean, he's straight six. Just a, the bull I could have dreamed of, for sure. I mean, when I, when I finally got up to him and put hands on him, I mean, heck, that's, the biggest bull before that I'd ever put hands on was probably only in the, you know, 340s. Yeah. And I thought that a 340s bull was huge. So, I mean, 60 inches was crazy.

Yeah, pretty much a 400 straight six point is, that's a lot. But then cool character, splits at the top of the four, splits at the top of the five. Big bull. Tell us, I mean, like, a lot went into your gun. I'm not sure, it doesn't look that legal. I mean, tell us, tell us a little, not judging you, but tell us a little bit about it. Well, I don't want to, I don't want to get myself in trouble here. It's got a, it's got a bolt on it. Is it a 50 cal? No, it's fine. I'm just teasing you. I'm just teasing. No, no. The gun is, I mean, my father-in-law is a huge long range shooter and he, he's the one that's kind of opened the door for that. So, when I drew the tag, he's like, hey, you know, it might be time to put something together. So, I mean, it's a, it's a 28 nozzler. I, it's got a 22 inch barrel on it, shooting suppressed, and then I'm shooting those Berger 195s.

And, I don't, I ought to get you guys the video, but put it on his high shoulder and it just folded him instantly. So, it's, it worked out pretty good. Berger would pay, Berger would pay you for that footage. That's rare. That's a rare footage.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Send us some video of that. We'd love to see that. It'd be good. It'd be good. Yeah. So, yeah, it ended up being great. It definitely was the hunt of a lifetime. And now I've got the, the elk fever. I'm like, how do I, I'm never going to be able to hunt bulls like that again, I don't think. So, I'm like, maybe I should have started getting points. Turn your applications over to Josh. We'll, we'll figure it out. Yeah. Yeah. He manages to pull good tags. So, I want to know, I want to know, I want to know something from you. That Josh would never admit to. But like, did you turn Josh on to his bull from all that scouting in September?

You know, I wish that I did. Okay. I wish. I actually felt kind of bad because he was on his moose hunt and, you know, we were, he was sending me messages on the inReach, kind of wanting updates. And I was so focused on myself. I didn't realize when his hunt started. And I would have loved to, I mean, he obviously ended up killing an amazing bull. But, yeah. I would have loved to help him more because I felt like it was all take on my part. I didn't really, I didn't really give him anything back. And if you would have helped him, he wouldn't have underachieved.

That's true. That's true. I might have been able to kill a bigger bull. A little bigger than the mid-380s. Yeah. I mean, that was, that was about, yeah, he killed the. He killed, he maximized the tag. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. For sure. When he, when he punched his tag in that bull, I was. He did well. Yeah. That's a no brainer. That's a stud bull for sure. So, yeah. That's the story. Just want to tell you congrats. Congrats, man. Awesome bull. Sure. Like to tease here a little bit, but it's all light. And just really appreciate you coming on. And, and what a, what an absolute giant. Thanks for showcasing it in the Epic Magazine here, the February issue. Just absolute crazy, awesome, incredible bull that anybody would love to have. So, sure, sure. Appreciate it. Yeah. Let me give you guys a plug real quick, too.

Like, I did mention it, you know, but I seriously, especially with Josh, I spent hours and hours talking to this guy. And he was, I mean, doing everything he could to help me find success. Yeah. Which, it really did mean a lot to me because it's intimidating. And the pressure you feel is crazy. So, even just having somebody who, who is, you know, who I've really looked up to as a good elk hunter, having him be able to tell me like, hey, you know, try this, you know, look during these times or, or, you know, check these kind of areas. Just, just those nice little tips that you get from lots of experience, that helped me a ton. So, it was, it was really great having, having the resource of Epic and you guys to, to help me out. It was, it was great. Well, we appreciate it. And I think too, a lot of it is just a personalized customer service.

Guys call in and we want, we want you guys to succeed. Like that's, that's part of it for us too. Why it's applying guys day in and day out. And yeah, sure. That's our job. But, but there's a little icing on the cake when guys actually get the tag in their hand and they're excited and plans are made and vacation days are made and, and then going on the hunt and, you know, Devin may have helped a guy find an outfit or whatever. And then it all comes together with a successful story. It's just, man, there's nothing better than that. You know? Yeah. There's care behind it, which is what's awesome. You guys care. Yeah. It means a lot. So. All right. So thanks again, fellas. All right. Well, have a great Friday. Have a great weekend. And yeah. Good luck in 2025. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Unfortunately, no sportsman's tag this year, but maybe we'll try next year. Yeah. Maybe it's a, maybe it's a deer.

Maybe we'll get back to the roots and go, go to mule deer. That'd be a thing of beauty. All right. Sounds good. Okay. All right. Take care, guys. Thank you. You betcha. Bye. All right. There you have it. Good story. Yeah. Really cool story. Fun. Guy's got more patience. I just was, man. Four hours? That's what I was just going to say is the thing that stuck out to me is he's 150 yards off road and he stays right there for four hours. Yeah. So crazy. You get a buzz right past him. He just holds tight. During another hunt. I mean, there's spike hunters out there. There's all the mid-season rifle hunters going out there. I mean, he's already went through the first original rifle season, so. It's not like he's in a meadow. It looks pretty thick. Yeah. He's just standing there. Standing there, chilling out. Yeah. That's what they do a lot of times late season, but that's not even that late.

Uh-uh. You know what I mean? Wow. And just, uh, I don't know. It was kind of meant to be, obviously. That's a unique story. And then just how he wanted to maximize the tag and just goes back to that. I mean, you put me mid-October after having two months and I'm sitting there on a 400-incher for all intents and purposes. I mean, I'm smashing it. But it is hard to judge. That bull's still three low 90s without the two extras. I mean, for a straight six. Yeah. It can get prettier than that. Yeah. Fatty at the top. Nothing broke. Yeah. Anyway. What's also impressive to me is he's a first-generation hunter. It's not easy to just pick up. It's not a family tradition and you've got to learn everything on your own. Yeah. Like, it's just, it's cool to see that's possible, you know. Really cool. Just learn. Learn and have people help you. Yeah. Okay.

We're going to be at the expo, the hunt expo, coming up here shortly, February 13 to 16, Salt Lake City. We've got a giant booth right there at the pinch point. You can't miss us. Look at the ceiling. We probably usually have banners. John, did you adjust that or we still have banners? Nope. We've got banners. Do we? We've got banners. We've got flags. We've got lights. We have fog, fog horns and freaking, yeah. Whatever. You shouldn't miss us. No? All right. Do we have flamethrowers? Oh, that's a good idea. We've got a cutout of Donald Trump. Is that legal? He's on our on-hold message system. We've got to have him show up, right? Yeah. Anyway, pretty exciting. We want to see you there. Come by the booth. We're going to be selling optics like it's our freaking job as well as talking hunting, going over strategies, you know, all kinds of stuff.

So we have a lot of clients that show up at the expo and we get to catch up with them. And so anyway, also want to throw a little shout out to Vortex Optics. Great optics at a great price. We sell Vortex. Of course, we sell all the brands. Happy to help you no matter what it is you need. Range finders, binoculars, spot and scopes, rifle scopes. I don't know what else there is. Thermal imaging if you're out doing that. Of course, smashing the predators with thermal. There's nothing better. However, we can help you with that and have done that ourselves. And so pretty fun. Pretty awesome. Great time to be alive. It's kind of fun. Some of these technologies are fun to be a part of. Of course, you know, some states you've got to watch the emerging technology rules and things like that. And totally agree with that kind of stuff. But when it comes to predators, anything goes. Let them have it.

Yeah. Don't you agree, Wyatt? I agree. 100%. But anyway, Vortex. Back to Vortex. If anything you need Vortex, let us know. They should be awesome. We carry about everything. We're going to have the best deals ever at the Hunt Expo. I want to throw a little shout out to Outdoor Edge Knives. Some of the best knives in the industry. Replaceable blades. We have Outdoor Edge Knives with Epic logo. And, you know, we've done great with those. And the replaceable blades and whatnot. Just super sharp. And they make all kinds of it. They make fillet knives. They make kitchen knives. They make gut hook knives. They make all kinds of the old traditional knives. Just a great company, Outdoor Edge. They'll be around for, it feels like, decades to come, centuries to come. Very, very excellent, well-managed company. That has great products.

And they're always on the cutting edge, no pun intended, of great products. So, anyway, you can kind of see how to get with them, within our e-mags, print mags. We've got ads for them and some of the different products that they've got. So, anyway, a little shout out to Outdoor Edge. Appreciate them and their partnership with us here at Epic Outdoors. I want to throw a little shout out to ourselves and our online odds. If you need anything online odds, try Epic Outdoors. It's, I feel like it's the best in the industry. We're constantly changing and molding depending on what we want personally. And extremely accurate. So, very proud of that portion of our business. And maybe somewhat overshadowed, something we don't talk a lot about. It's hard to talk about your own business. We like to just do podcasts and be normal dudes.

But, man, right here in the middle of application season, being January, we've got five months of this, six months of this. And we're doing it every single day and dealing with it every single day. And hundreds and thousands of clients and working with them on developing strategies and whatnot. And that's the best tool we got. And it helps a lot. Of course, I would say our in the field knowledge within all of our consultants here is the best of anybody in the industry. Every one of us hunt all western states at some point. And maybe even multiple times in a short period of time. So, anyway, we do have a lot of boots on the ground experience. And we don't really hold back here. We help everybody and want you to be successful and whatnot. Nah, there's a few things in our backyard or whatever. We're entitled to a few things. We're following specific animals or whatnot.

But having said that, we're very transparent in helping guys make the most of their points, make the most of their financial investment, time investment. Do you have anything to add to that, Wyatt or Devin? I think you nailed it. But if you haven't been on our website and logged in, you really should. I would agree with that. Whether you're looking for a piece of optics to see your discounts, things like that, and especially the odds, you definitely check it out. It saves you a lot of time. Yeah, it saves you so much time. And it's just clarity. You just can, and it gives you something to chew on for a minute. Like, oh, these are my real options. Like, you know, and, you know, everybody, there's a lot of people out there with a lot of knowledge, a lot of great hunters within the Epic Outdoors community.

And so some guys may, you may learn a piece of information or something as you're chewing on what your options are for Colorado. Colorado rigs aren't even out yet. But we're answering Colorado calls every day. It's one of those, it's a preference point state where you can kind of tell the future on what you can get drawn. And so people like to chew on it. And as they go to the expo and they rub shoulders with other serious hunters, you might learn something. You might be like, man, that sounds like the hunt for me. And you might have the points needed to get it. So anyway, no matter what species it is, no matter how many points you have, there's something for you. That's the one thing I think some, some, I've heard it said in the industry that point systems are the thing of the past. It's that they don't really work. All of these things.

A guy coming out this year has options to have a tag in his pocket. A hundred percent. We're not talking over the counter. Drawing in deer tag in Colorado, zero points. Promise you there's options for you. So I just don't believe, I don't buy into this, points aren't working. Points are freaking working. We're doing it every year. Are we not, Wyatt? We are. We're drawing tags. Every single year. Cash, how old are you? 27. Do you feel like you have options? Oh, absolutely. Do you feel like the point systems work? Absolutely. Now, you might not be able to get a Unit 10 early rifle elk tag in Arizona. And so you could easily just write it off and say, eh, they don't work. They pump the brakes. They're freaking working. There's options for you. And you might kill an absolute giant. And it's not Unit 10. So anyway, just wanted to dispel that. They are working. There are options.

Yeah, there's a lot of demand. Demand's never been greater. And also, I mean, trophy quality's waned a bit deer-wise. And so we've, us included, we're thinking 24-7 about where the next big deer's going to come from. And yeah, it's challenging, but that's all part of it. It's part of the game, right? Utilizing points in weird places. There's a drought down south. We're headed up north. Or should be. Sometimes guys like me, if there's a drought, I follow the drought. And I kill crap, you know? Or I don't kill anything. Because there's nothing but crap. So anyway, whatever. Or, you know, don't hit it always perfect. Wyatt seems to choose the right years and the right tags. And I think I'm going to follow Wyatt a little more. Just got lucky a few times. Tried to talk you into following him yesterday, and you're not having it. No. Well, I mean. Tell me about it. I missed this conversation.

They want me to go to Oregon. Oh, yeah. Would you have it? What'd you say? Exactly. Hey, actually, there's some big deer in Oregon. I've been thinking about it. I've got points. I'm going to. That's a perfect example. You'd be surprised. If you haven't points, you've had for how long? You don't know what the purpose of those points are. Yeah. But at some point in your life, they all of a sudden could have a big purpose. Well, I learned about some elk stuff, and I was like, I could do that. And then I've got points from 1953 that might actually become useful. Yes. Right? And I'm actually kind of kicking myself that I went stagnant for a decade. You know what I'm saying? And so, but hey, they're waiting for me. And it's calling my name. So, you just never know. Get points. You never know. Get points. Then you have options. Points equal options. And I'm over it. We're done.

This podcast is over. It's gone too long. Josh is out dealing with a birder. That's why he went a little bit quiet on the end of the story. We're going to sell optics to a birder, John? Is that what we're doing? Yeah. I mean. If she walks out of here without optics, she's no longer welcome here. I mean. I'm just telling you. Some of them are dedicated. Jim Jets came and bought some for his wife. They're going to Costa Rica on a birding trip. Yeah. I mean, that's pretty awesome. Well, it's awesome. But he's a hardcore hunter. Yeah. I'd like to see what she. I'd like to see a look on her face at some of these mounts. We'll see. We'll see. Yeah. We'll see. We'll see what comes of that. Yeah. Never mind. Look. Go ahead, Devin. I would just say, don't let her walk through the office. There might be a bird or two. There's a bird in Wendy's office at the front door. Mounted. Oh, yeah. Mounted.

There's a pheasant. It's true. Big old rooster. As long as it's not some illegal variety. Just because she's a bird doesn't mean she doesn't like killing pheasants. I agree. Maybe she's just scouting for later in her life. No. You know? They're not. They're not. They're looking at pretty colors. Every once in a while when I can't see anything, I'm glassing. I'll zoom in on a bird. You know? I don't know. Just to look at the colors. Yeah. There used to be, and I'm not going to say names, but there was a guy and he would be like, he'd be glassing and, you know, and I had a client and he would be like, man, there's a sheep, you know, and he'd glass over there and he'd go, oh, I think that's a rock. You know? Being really nice. And he goes, but I really like that rock. And then they would sit there and look at the rock and being really nice to the client. You know? That's a rare one. Yeah.

It's such a pretty rock. Look at the color varieties and the contour. Just being so kind. Anyway, I could use a little of that. We could be kinder, John. Yeah. Let's be kind this week. It's Friday. It's over. Well, that's good because the new week, does it start? I hate how the calendar rolls. Does the new week start on a Sunday or a Monday? I think it starts on a Monday, but. But the calendar says Sunday, right? Yeah. Sunday? Technically, yes. So let's be kind for today and tomorrow. Friday and Saturday. Yeah. Okay? Rest of the week. There's one other thing I'll say about the birding thing. Like I've gone to a birding convention or two and just on the optics world. If the government put the same kind of money they put into birding and they did into hunting, it would be insane. There's an app. And it's, if you have Indian interest in birds, like you should get it.

It's Merlin and it's funded by the government. You take a picture of a bird, it'll tell you exactly what it is. And like 15 million things about it. You hit, if you hear a bird calling, you hit record. It'll tell you what, by the sound of the, you know, the call, what bird it is. And it's dang accurate. Dang accurate. Wow. I mean, if the government put it, you know, that kind of money into the hunting world, you could take a picture of something and it would score it for you. I wonder. I'm telling you. I wonder if the Trump administration, if they're going to cut, if this is going to be one of them programs they cut. Possibly. But I mean, they can say, well, we're conserving and we're helping in this. We need some conservation.

Well, the one downside is if we had that app in the hunting world, then you can no longer claim ignorance when you kill a wolf thinking it's a coyote. You know what I mean? Yes. It would be rough. There's some blessings. So now at least you can say. I don't know. I feel like hunters are pretty good at identifying the species we're looking at. I'm just saying. No, I'm just saying like there would be some awesome AI stuff that, you know, like. Then again, you go to Colorado and they have signs of moose that says, this is not an elk. Do not shoot this. Do not shoot this. There have been a lot of elk go to California with deer tags. Okay. And there's been some deer with elk tags guaranteed. Sure. Okay. So just saying. You're overestimating every hunter, Dan. That's true. Well, that elk was really easy. Not everybody's a member of Epic Outdoor. Let's face it.

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or give them a call at 855-711-7577 to learn more. Vortex makes optics for every occasion. Whether you're a long range shooter dialing in that perfect shot or an archery hunter in need of an easy to carry optic without sacrificing quality, Vortex has you covered. Head over to epicoptics.com or call us to learn more about your Vortex options today at 435-263-0777. From top of the line hunting blinds to game calls that can't be beat, GSM Outdoors has you covered for whatever outdoor equipment you need. For all of their products, head over to gsmoutdoors.com to learn more. Thompson Long Range has perfected the art of simple, affordable long range shooting. If you don't want to calculate ballistics or adjust your turrets before making a shot, a Thompson Long Range system is for you. Simply range, place the hash mark for that distance on the animal, and pull the trigger.

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