21 Richie Nankz Knivez - Knives and Deer Stalking

What happens when military precision meets artisanal craftsmanship? Richie Nank's journey from Royal Marine commando to sought-after custom knife maker reveals the unexpected parallels between battlefield discipline and the meticulous art of blade making.

Richie shares how a simple bet to make a knife in 2016 transformed into a thriving business built on understanding the specific needs of deer stalkers. With refreshing candor, he explains his detailed approach to customization—considering everything from the stalker's experience level to hand size and target species. "I genuinely call myself the best custom knife maker in the UK," Richie boldly states, backing this claim with explanations of how he tailors each knife's geometry, handle material, and steel selection to create truly personalized tools.

The conversation takes us to County Wicklow, Ireland, where Richie recently hunted the notoriously challenging Sika deer—"the Royal Marines of deer"—offering gripping accounts of these hyper-alert animals that can run substantial distances even after perfect shot placement. His descriptions of the unforgiving Irish terrain and weather conditions highlight why proper equipment matters in extreme stalking situations.

What truly sets this episode apart is Richie's passion for building community through craftsmanship. His "Crew Membership" connects knife owners who share experiences and support each other, reflecting his military ethos of brotherhood. This extends to his touching acknowledgment of mentors and supporters who helped establish his business, demonstrating how traditional crafts create meaningful human connections in our digital age.

Whether you're a seasoned stalker, knife enthusiast, or simply appreciate stories of reinvention and craftsmanship, this episode offers valuable insights into the intersection of military precision, artisanal skill, and the primal pursuit of deer stalking. Listen now and discover how the perfect edge can make all the difference in the field and in life.

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Transcript

Introduction to Richard Nank's Knives

Speaker 3 0:24

Hello and welcome to the Outdoor Given Podcast, episode 21. We are interviewing Richard from Richard Nank's Knives everything to do with knife making and deer stalking and how he got into where he is today. It's been a while since we recorded a podcast. I apologise for that. It's been an absolutely mental time, juggling normal work as well as a busy stag season. Anybody that follows my social media feed will have seen just how all the stags we've taken and what we've been up to on the hill. We're now well into the hinds but I'm not going to bore you for too long with a big long introduction. But I'm not going to bore you for too long with a big long introduction. This podcast actually recording was over two hours, so we will get straight on with it and there'll be some news update podcasts to follow later on. Hello and welcome to the outdoor given podcast. Today we've got richie nanks knives with us.

Speaker 2 1:41

Hello, richie hello peter, how you doing, mate, I'm good, good, good.

Speaker 3 1:46

So, uh, yeah, I think you've just got back in from stalking. So, uh, I think we've all been a bit rushed to to get this one sorted and it's taken a while to actually manage to pin each other down to actually record this podcast. So, um, yeah, welcome, welcome to the. Uh, welcome to the, the cast.

Speaker 2 2:02

Thank you, mate, thank you. So, as a little introduction, who am I? So I'm a 40 year old retired military lad, very passionate about my military career, never hid behind it, had a fantastic career, so served in multiple tours of afghanistan, iraq, northern ireland, afghanistan, northern ireland again, and then out to norway. Um 25 ish years of service and spent 14 years deployed right, okay, so that's a little bit about me, but obviously that's my history.

Speaker 3 2:44

Well, the go-to question is obviously there's that, but let history. Well, the go-to question is obviously there's that, but let's wind it back a bit. Yeah, because obviously the the main question I always ask everybody is we'll come back around again, but basically the question is how did you get into shooting?

Speaker 2 2:58

yeah, um so shooting. So I grew up as obviously where I live I'm situated down in the deep, dark parts of Cornwall very rural landscape. Both uncles always had beating dogs, always out picking up, made to walk through rhododendrons and cut your own path type sketch at the start of the season dendrums and cut your own path type sketch at the start of the season um, you acted like a labrador or a, uh, well-trained spaniel. Um, at an early age grew into air rifle shooting rabbits and squirrels, my next door's pigeons who had a pigeon lotsman. Um, then I suppose I turned 16 and I joined the military. So I joined the military very early, uh, and to the deer's demise, I then became very good at shooting.

Speaker 3 3:57

I was gonna say, was it the shooting before or the military that actually helped you get the shooting?

Richard's Military Background and Stalking Origins

Speaker 2 4:03

Yeah, definitely the training side of being in the military helped me adapt into deerstalking world, Bearing in mind I joined the military at 16. You're not allowed an FAC until you're 18. So I already had two years of centrefire rifle shooting under my belt Then. I think it was like 2004,. I think I applied for my FAC. Right.

Speaker 2 4:34

I think it was something, maybe even a little bit earlier, and I was fully granted. It was like well, if you, if you can do it at work, uh, we're not really in any position to say you can't do it here, um, which is fantastic, you know I suppose back in 2004.

Speaker 3 4:51

Anyway, things were a bit different. Trying to get hold of an FAC, there was possibly slightly less restrictions on it than they're putting on it sort of nowadays, aren't they? Oh, oh?

Speaker 2 5:01

absolutely, um, I think, um the. I think the only restriction I had was because I deployed quite a lot. My rifle and shotgun was kept at my uncle's house, who also had an fac and a shotgun certificate, and we had a dual register. We were dual registered with each other Right which he did very well out of it, because I had a load of excess money. No mortgage, no, nothing like that. I had state of the art kit and he was like you keep buying it, I'll use it.

Speaker 3 5:35

So it was he definitely got the better end of the deal, that one definitely got the better end of the stick.

Speaker 2 5:42

So, so yeah, um, but you're right, I think that was the only kind of little restriction and it was because, like, I would deploy for six months or something like that and they'd be like, well, at least your, your, your firearms are actually being cared for as such yeah they were.

Speaker 3 5:58

They were kind of locked away and secure and there was always somebody there, rather than just locked in an empty property kind of thing that's it.

Speaker 2 6:04

Yeah, um, but in the military you do have the I have where I have deployed. Before I've moved all of my rifles and shotguns into the camp's armory and and just notified devon and cornwall and said there's my kit, it's now in this lockup and they're like yeah, thank you ever so much for letting us know um nice and, to be honest, military armories once you put it in there, that's it, it's now in this, lock up and they're like yeah, thank you ever so much for letting us know.

Speaker 3 6:27

Nice. And, to be honest, military armories once you put it in there, that's it, it's, it's not coming out there by anybody else getting them out is the hardest bit. Yeah, absolutely yeah, no, absolutely. So that obviously leads us on. So you, you carried on with your military career, but were you shooting outside of that, or was it? Um was only when you were back home, and stuff like that yeah, absolutely so.

Speaker 2 6:48

I would have my leave um and I lived a bit of a different lifestyle because I was based um in, like the Taunton areas, quite a bit okay yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 7:02

So so I wasn't. I was. I was never too far away from where I lived, but I was never kind of home on my doorstep, if you know what I mean. Um, which leads me on. I was based at barnstable, uh, for like four, four to five years, um, and I became really really good friends with a bloke called ryan brentnell who lives in oak hampton, which is about 40 minutes away, and the nights I would stay there, I would go out foxing till like three in the morning and we'd be out, or, and he'd have to go to college because he's a bit younger than me. I'd be in camp for like eight o'clock the next morning, bags under my eyes, but out shooting, where most lads are out drinking and whatnot like that. I was out shooting deer, stalking, foxing, lamping x, y and z.

Speaker 3 7:52

So having shot around taunton and places like that it is. It's a fantastic bit of landscape and there's so much to go on oh yeah, I mean within.

Speaker 2 8:01

I mean I. I actually acquired quite a bit of ground around the camps that I was based around, because I would be like I'm here all weekend, I'm a camp orphan, I'm not going home. Can I just walk around your farm and they're like Matt, you shoot what you want, I don't really care. But it's a very different world that we live in now.

Speaker 3 8:22

Oh, totally.

Speaker 2 8:23

Very different, a very different world that we live in now. Oh, totally very different. So, um, very uh, I've been blessed, as a lot of people say, that I've got this, like when, as soon as you say, watch, I'm a raw marine, I I'm, I'm trusted by a lot of people. Therefore, a farmer goes well. If I can't trust you, who can type sketch?

Speaker 3 8:42

it's kind of yeah, you're not just some sort of nobody knocking on his door, can I bring my rifle onto your land, kind of thing, which is is where most people get a bit panicky, and I think that's probably it's grown more and more as time goes by. So actually, yeah, we've, we've come out a bit of a winner really. You've. You've done well to land, get, get lots of land from it.

Speaker 2 9:02

Well, I've also educated quite a few people on like um, how you should like. Don't turn up in your camouflage kit with real tree kit on with your balaclava on that. You've been sat in a pigeon hide. Don't go and approach a farmer's wife dressed like that. Go and put a smart shirt on, put your jeans on, go and say hello, mind your p's and q's, be polite, speak to them directly, say what you've got to say and if they say no, say thank you ever so much. I'm sorry to have bothered you. And then move on. And lots of people have gone. Richie, I've knocked on six doors today and I've picked up a thousand acres and I'm like that's brilliant, buddy, well done. And they're like I would have never have done it before if you didn't say about actually dressing correctly and speaking correctly to these people yeah, it doesn't take a lot.

Speaker 3 9:52

And you hear all these stories. I can't get land and it's like, well, what did you go in? I went in the shooting clothes or my camouflage. And you're just like, well, they're not going to just go. Yeah, this random lad's turned up in cat, full camouflage, looking to go shooting on my land. It's it doesn't happen, does it no?

Speaker 2 10:08

no, it doesn't, unless, unless you're like I, I he will get to learn you in that scenario, won't he? Um, but I think first impressions are huge, especially when you say can I bring a firearms inadvertently? Can I bring a firearms onto your land and wander around at night with a firearms? He, he's like who the hell is this guy? Yeah, exactly, yeah, that's the question.

Speaker 3 10:29

That's the first question that comes to his head. So I don't know you, why do you bring a gun on my fields, exactly, yeah, so, carrying on from that, obviously that leads us to um, the next part of your sort of journey, which is, obviously you got into knife making. Now, that happened while still in the army, or was that something that, as you finished and retired from the army, you started uh, started the knife making?

Speaker 2 10:52

yeah, um, so I'm going to correct you. I weren't in the army. That's like saying sorry, dianasta you were in the marines yeah, yeah um, but yeah, I, I knew so.

Speaker 2 11:05

So because of my and without going too much in to detail to it, my, my ethos of uh, how I've lived my military career is promote the youth um. You, you cannot win wars with deadwood. Is is like a real good terminology. You have to have youth that learn experience, that get the experience that then pass it on, and if you forever are stagnant, you will never, ever progress. So I've always had the desire to learn and promote the youth.

Speaker 2 11:39

Um, when I got to my 23 years of service and bearing in mind I served about 18 months as a child, so that didn't contribute towards my pension, so I had to do about 16 months extra, I think. In the end, um, they asked me to do another five years and I said, if I do another five years, I will stop the promotion of 48 lads. And that went against every single kind of grain that I had had, like my ethos of how I kind of like wanted my career to flourish. Um, so I knew that my career would end, uh, when, when it was predicted to end as such, and there's not many jobs that you can get to the highest, nearly the highest rank, get a star reports and they say thank you ever so much, but you're not needed anymore.

From Military Career to Knife Making

Speaker 2 12:38

And that is the military. That is exactly what it is. Is exactly what it is. Um. So I decided in 2016 to make a bet with a friend and he said you, you claim you can do anything, make me a set of knives. And I went fine. Uh, the first one was ridiculously crap. The second was a little bit better and the third I still own today right okay so.

Speaker 2 13:06

So I found something that I was fairly good at. Now I have a degree in engineering some people might go so that means that you can build a gearbox but you don't know how it works type sketch. But I do know how to build a gearbox and I do know how they work. I studied geometry at school so I understand edge retention. I understand processes of how things are done, so I understand how to get that knife hard. I understand shape and convex part of like your hands and how you handle things. So, inadvertently, I make fitted shotguns for the knife men if you know, yeah, yeah, yeah so I took that concept of it.

Speaker 2 13:55

Um, so how did it really start? It started with a bet that ended me up making a lot of knives. Um, and I think what I've done well for is because I I'm a tradesman as a trade, but I'm a deerstalker at heart. So I am, like, inadvertently, always looking for something a little bit better. I'm always looking for that better edge. I'm look, an edge being a word, um, I'm looking to progress all the time and I've just put all that energy into knives and I think that's what's working for me in a real flippant way, that it's just kind of like god, I'm now in the industry of the trade, of the deer stalking world. Uh, I now have contacts throughout europe, you know, and it's gone from a silly little bet in my workshop of can can you do this? And I was like too stubborn to say no.

Speaker 3 14:58

I suppose but that's how some, some of the best, start, I suppose, isn't it you? You start off with the idea, and, and the acorn, and it, and it becomes the tree. So you're, you're in the process of, of flourishing into the, into that sort of that, that fully grown oak tree that's coming out of the ground, kind of thing yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2 15:18

Um, and like jumping back to like the deer stalking side. Um, I did my dsc level two quite late. Um, I think there was about 13 years between my dsc1 and my dsc2 and it was because I just didn't need it. I didn't require it, I didn't need anybody to to assess me, I didn't know any aws was one of them. Um, uh, no one, no farmer ever asked me are you a dsc level two so you can shoot on my ground? Um, and then one day a opportunity came to go and work for the forestry commission that I still work for now, but the dsc level two was the minimum requirement yeah I then did that and then went on to become an aw and I started looking at people and I was watching them like use knives.

Speaker 2 16:08

And this was before I, uh, became a knife smith. I was like if that, if you had a sharp knife, you would have passed today, because you have hacked away at that throat so much that the esophagus is now bleeding out Grollock. I'm like you haven't done this, you haven't and it's all because you haven't got a sharp knife. So I really saw a market there that when, yes, people can go and buy a 10 quid orange handled knife, that's fine. If that's what you want, then keep the bloody thing sharp and use it correctly, clean it, use it correctly. I have no problem with that.

Speaker 2 16:53

But because we're a human race of wanting better and that is ultimately what we're into, I was like no, no, no, people don't want just the average. People do actually want custom, people do want better, people do want stuff that lasts. And I quickly, when I made that bet when, actually, if I do this well, I can get into a market here, because I know the deer world, I know what people want, I will understand in process and time what more people will want, and I think that's my, that's my heaven I suppose, because, yeah, I suppose you're right because actually the orange handled knife you talk about, lots of people have them and if you keep it sharp it does exactly what it says on the tin.

Speaker 3 17:41

It's like your backup knife. 100, the, the, the bespoke knife market was, I don't know. It's probably in the last sort of five to six years it's really kicked off and there's there's more. There's definitely more competition for you, but everybody likes to have that sort of. It's a bit of an heirloom, isn't it? It's like having an antique shotgun or something like that, something you can pass on down down to the next part part of the family or something. So a quality knife is well, that's what I've done. I've made some knives and then for my kids, at the end of the day, that that is my trademark. Here you go, kids, pass that on, and if you don't want it, make sure it gets passed on again yeah, definitely, definitely.

Speaker 2 18:19

Um, and that's a really good thing because I I genuinely call myself probably the best custom knife maker in the UK and I know someone will go bollocks, well, out of bollocks. But I genuinely believe that and I will tell you why, because this is the kind of conversation I have with a deer stalker over someone that goes and buys a knife off a shelf. First of all, it starts off with what kind of level deerstalker are you? Are you a novice? Are you a recreational deerstalker, or are you, let's call it a professional deerstalker? And those three elements are very different. So we have a novice that doesn't know where a flat joint is or an atlas joint. Therefore, that edge is going to take a lot more abuse. Therefore, I suggest that we put a thicker edge, a 25 degree angle on it, instead of a professional deerstalker that might have a 17 degree angle on it, which will last a lot more because he's not making those errors. So instantly I am tailoring a knife for him. I then go what do you shoot? He says to me I shoot mainly muntjac and some roe with the odd fallow. Or he says I shoot mainly red deer. Okay, automatically.

Speaker 2 19:42

We have two different types of scenarios. We need a bigger, thicker knife for red deer, for bleeding it correctly and getting in and around the big cavity. Therefore, we need a bigger knife, muntjac exactly the opposite. Nice dainty knife where we have to use around small anal glands and whatnot to get in there and we don't need a bigger knife. Therefore, I'm tailoring that to that person. Then we go okay, what style of knife do you want? Do you want a clip point? Do you want a nesmo? Do you want a? Uh, straight back.

Speaker 2 20:15

Then we we're talking now and we're going jesus christ, we're only talking knives, but we've got so many parameters, yeah, that this guy has to choose from. Then we say what type of handle do you want it? The professional guy goes I just want an orange handle that I know where it will be when I put it down, when I'm doing three animals fantastic, that's what we can cater for. The novice goes well, actually I just need something sturdy, something that's gonna meet the food hygiene standard when I go and do my dsc level one and my two, et cetera, et cetera. So so we're looking at different parameters that way.

Speaker 2 20:50

Then you say handle fitment and this is the biggest thing is I take the measurement of your hand. Now I've become a bit of a connoisseur on size of men's hands. Yeah, fair enough, because the average hand is about eight and a half to nine centimeters long. Well, my friend ryan brentnell has got over 11 centimeter hands. He's six foot six, six foot eight. He's 20 stone massive, great big hands. Well, he can't use my knife correctly because it doesn't fit him. It doesn't work.

The Art of Custom Knife Making

Speaker 2 21:26

It's like eating your roast dinner with a pitchfork. You know you well. Actually, give me a proper fork. I need a fork to eat, I don't need a pitchfork. And then you go. Jesus christ, we haven't even started making these knives yet. And I've taken all that information and I tailored that design to him.

Speaker 2 21:46

We then talk about sheeps. Are you a shoot one deer, put, use your knife, clean your knife with your little wipes and whatnot. You go on, lovely stuff, yeah, got a lot of time for that. Or are you the realistic part? Are you shooting like yourself? Up on the hill, you wipe your, your knife in the grass or on the back of his, his coat and you put it. And you put it in your sheath, in your plastic sheath, goes in your pocket and you're on to the next one and it's all about tailoring the, the, the perception of what that person actually is getting, and I know that people go yeah, I could go and buy a Mora knife and that would do everything. You're absolutely right, it can. But some people want more and I'm the answer. I'm the answer to wanting more.

Speaker 3 22:33

Um, my custom scales are, I would say, really what sell me, because I was going to say because you do a completely custom acrylic scale, don't you Resin yeah, resin yeah.

Speaker 2 22:46

It's resin, ok. I mean I've had people send me pin feathers from their woodcock that they've shot a pair of woodcock. I've had feathers from falconry boys that have taken it from their kestrels. I've even had people's ashes, their dad ashes, where he said I'm going to send you a matchbox with some ashes in it. It's my dad, I want it in my knife, I want to go stalking with him for the rest of my life and I'm like do you know what, mate? We don't need to part money. That's free, because this this is this means something way more than cost and it's endless. I mean I did a land rover, one for a for somebody. He said my dad's mega into land rovers, can you do a land rover theme um knife? And I was like absolutely, I went and got some badges with the land rover emblem on it and I made this beautiful knife handled out of it, out of land rover, out of land Rover badges, and he was over the moon and I was like that's custom, that's it's the personal touch, isn't it?

Speaker 2 23:49

it is, mate. You're absolutely right, and and I think that if you're gonna call yourself a custom knife maker, you have to start ticking more boxes than can I buy that knife off the shelf yeah, if you buy that knife off the shelf. That ain't custom, that's that's retail.

Speaker 3 24:09

It's exactly. It's knocked out in a factory, banged together and sold out, and that's it. But the next question is obviously we've talked about the customization. Now let's let's go back to the bones of this knife, which is actually the steel and the hardness, and and how you get to where you are with it.

Speaker 2 24:28

Basically, yeah so. So I, being an engineer, I'm a bit of a geek in the workshop. I like machinery, I like tools. I like I've got a 25 grand snap-on toolbox that I could never afford. I should have never brought it, but because I loved it I did. Uh, my wife went mad at me when she was like how much have you just spent on a toolbox?

Speaker 3 24:51

I was like god.

Speaker 2 24:53

But um, I have a hardness tester, so that gives me a parameter of where, when I heat, treat the steel, because before it becomes a knife, it's just a piece of metal. Before I even start working on that, I make sure that it is in a parameter of what we call 59 to 61 HRC, a hard rock test, right, and if it's not, if it's 58. Three, I throw it in the scrap metal bin.

Speaker 2 25:27

I do not take any kind of mitigation.

Speaker 2 25:32

Ok, and what that does is it allows me to guarantee my work. Because when I send out a knife and I know that it's in the parameters of what it should if it goes dull and you dent it or you break an edge on it or you put a crack in it, I know that you have misused that knife. And because I've got a good enough background of the thousands of deer I have shot, I know that if you decide to go down through a big fallow bucks rib cage and you then put that edge, roll that edge and want that and you think you've got the audacity to have a go at me because the edge hasn't lasted, have a guess what we have a conversation about. Okay, buddy, this needs a bit of education. Not many knives are going to do that. However, what I will say is I have split loads of rib cages and loads of etch bones on young roe bucks. Young roe does lots and lots of muntjac. I haven't shot um, a chinese water deer, but I would imagine that they're quite a soft animal.

Speaker 3 26:33

Yeah, um, just out of, just out of what size, wise and all the rest of it they've got to be. They've got to be smaller bone and lighter bone than that of going on to fallow and red, haven't they?

Speaker 2 26:44

and seeker especially wow, you're absolutely right. Um, so, so you can get away with it. But again it comes back to that custom bit where I sold a set of knives to a bloke the other day and he said I'm shooting 500 fallow a year and I want to be splitting chest bones with your knives. And I was like, let me go and find a different steel for you. And I went and found a different steel. Um, that has got a working hardness. So it's it's not brittle, but it's a working hardness of about 68 to 71 and it's a really, really hard, hard metal.

Speaker 3 27:24

So it's a bit like a tool steel almost in very much so, yeah, very much so.

Speaker 2 27:29

Um, he said I think he's on something like 45 deer right and I was like what? And you've gone for? He said, fallow mate. And I am opening chests up and I made them quite long, where they're quite a bit of leverage through them and whatnot, so he's got a good old grip to handle onto them.

Speaker 2 27:45

And I was like yeah, but that steel is like 25 times the price yeah yeah, of stainless steel, um, but it's what he wanted and he was like I need that because of what he's doing. Um, where I was like do you know what you can buy? A 10 quid?

Speaker 3 28:03

saw, you know that I was gonna say a saw is really useful and it's like you do exactly what it says on the tin. It cuts open bone, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 28:13

but he didn't want that and that is what he wanted and we got. We got to the final bit. He did I. I have no bones and qualms about saying that he has to look after that knife, he has to resharpen that knife after a certain amount of animals and he has to maintain it. No different than checking zero.

Speaker 3 28:35

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 28:36

You know, checking zero is probably as important as they come, but I would say making sure your knife is as sharp as it can be before you go out is is not far behind um, that's it at the end of the day, that that tool, that knife in your pocket is everything.

Speaker 3 28:54

Especially, as you were saying, I'm up on the hill, a sharp knife is crucial. The work you've got to do up there to make sure that deer comes down it's like especially opening up those reds in the rut. It you've just got to make sure it's sharp so it just gets in there. Clean job, you're off the hill as quick as possible absolutely, absolutely, mate, um, uh, absolutely, um.

Speaker 2 29:14

I work with three different steels, so three different stainless steels um 14c28n, which is a scandinavian steel. Um sf 100, which is a british steel made from sheffield, which is really good. I'm really enjoying that steel at the moment because one it backs british, you know, british made, yeah, yeah, which I'm, which I'm quite patriotic about, um, it's cheaper, which has allowed me to keep my prices down. Um, which again moves on to making sure that I'm hitting that market, I'm hitting the working man and I'm not robbing him, because I, you know, I come from a real hardworking family, real like calloused hand family, and if I can, if I can keep my prices down, then that then adds on. I'm not really uh, and I don't want to sound patronizing, but like I've got a good pension, um, therefore, I don't feel like I've got to rob someone x amount of hundreds um for for a knife. So, and the other one is aelb, um, aebl, sorry um, that seems to be very common, that's.

Speaker 3 30:30

You hear that come up quite a lot. Lots of people use it for the custom knives and stuff like that. It gets a good shine on it as well, doesn't it yeah, it is, mate.

Speaker 2 30:39

Uh, it's got a different process of of hardening, which is fine. Um, if someone requests that, I will go. Yeah, no problem, I'll go and buy a length and and and deal with that. Um, but ultimately it comes down to how much of a geek you are in understanding carbon content. And we're talking minuscule, because they're all within a certain parameter of each other. So in some ways, if you want a blank that costs this much, but a blank that costs this much, um, it's your problem. Really, you know, because they're all going to do theoretically the same thing.

Speaker 3 31:20

Um, as long as they're heat treated and hardened correctly, you're going to get the same product that's the key and it's getting the right edge and the sharpness and all your angles which you were talking about earlier on is is crucial at the end of the day absolutely um, under understanding geometry about even, even edges and how they work, and one side not taking too much stress over another one.

Speaker 2 31:47

So making sure everything's kind of even is is key. I mean, I have a little rule um, I sharpen some other people's knives. I don't like doing it, purely because I think they should go back to their own knife smith. That that made it um, but ultimately some knife smiths pass on um, and so I have a little rule is is the knife sentimental? Uh, yes, it is. Then I'll sharpen it for you. Uh, has the knife smith passed on and died? Yes, he has. Then I'll sharpen it for you. Um, is that got a huge amount of? Uh like, are you that connected to that knife that you can't buy one of mine? Yeah, is that your? Is that? And then I'll sharpen it for you. Um, however, I I refuse to sharpen other people's knives that I'm like. No, you send that back to him.

Speaker 2 32:47

Yeah, exactly he, he deserves to sharpen his own kit. You I don't know why you're sending it to me, and I'm sure that there's knife smiths that have gone. Why am I sharpening one of richie nanks's knives? Um, yeah, yeah, totally, I'm pretty sure there is, you know so, a little bit of like. What's the word?

Speaker 3 33:05

Tradesman equity, I suppose is that I suppose that's what it is in the market, and there's a lot of people out there, there's a lot of these knife companies that, yeah, you to keep your guarantee, isn't it? You have to kind of send the knife back to them for sharpening.

Speaker 2 33:18

Yeah, and that's something I do. I run a free sharpening service and all I ask for is you to pay the postage. So if you buy a knife off me, you get a free sharpening service. Um, at that time, because of the way I am, I will always polish it as well. Um, you send it to me and I had a lad the other day. He sent me his. He said Richie, he said I've done 25 reds, uh, in the last three months, or something like that. Uh, it's gone dull. Can you sharpen it for me? Here's a fiver to send it back and I go absolutely fine, it came to me on a wednesday morning. I sharpened it, I polished it, I had it back in the post wednesday afternoon. He received it thursday. He was growling deer thursday night and you know it's. It's a, it's a service that I think is adequate. I think it's something that should go hand in hand. Um, but I also do a lot of educational bits where I go. Actually, I want you to be able to sharpen it yourself.

Speaker 3 34:19

I think I think that's important really if you've got this tool and you don't know how to sharpen it. It's like, well you, that's something you really need to learn, that, yeah, I think that's, that's a fundamental.

Speaker 2 34:29

It's like any part of deer stalking you need to know how to zero your rifle and sharpen your knife really I think they're the two most fundamental parts of if you haven't learned this yet, if you know where all the glands are in a deer but you do not know how to sharpen your knife. I'm not going to say you need a word with yourself, but you need a little bit of time spent in a bedroom sharpening a kitchen knife of some sort.

Speaker 3 34:54

Go let go, let us sharpen the knife and cut something, because actually, realistically, there's not always going to be somebody there to hold your hand, especially you're stuck on the hill and it's gone dull. You've got to do something, haven't you?

Speaker 2 35:05

you've got to do something. Well, I, what's the?

Speaker 3 35:07

I think do not the dsc level one go and uh, a dull knife is a dangerous knife or something I think, yeah, something like that yeah I think they say a sharp knife is a safe knife um or something it is, and I've always I've always tried to teach the scouts and all the rest of it if you're going to have a, a sharp knife, at least it's a clean cut and we can stick it back together quickly. But if you've got a dull knife, it's a jaggedy cut and it makes a hell of a mess, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 35:34

oh, absolutely, absolutely, mate, it's.

Speaker 3 35:37

But it's one of those things you probably well we've we've both seen it. You get people that have got knives that it's like you could do more damage with a spoon well, I always say if you haven't got a sharp knife, you have got a spoon pretty much exactly. You're not going to cut anything with it, are you? So it is worrying really, but um yeah, well, hopefully there'll be lots of people going.

Speaker 2 35:59

Maybe should that's one, but what I want for christmas is learn how to sharpen stuff and I and I absolutely do not hide behind any kind of uh, silver cloud lining that I only talk about my own knives. If, if people are using a knife, bearing in mind the knife has been around for thousands and thousands and thousands of years, if you don't know how to sharpen it, then watch one of my videos on instagram and you, you will learn something. I mean, at the stalking show, at the shooting show last year, I had thousands of people asking me questions about wow, is that all you do? And I'm like oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's not a complex. This is not, this is definitely not rocket science. Yeah, it's a process that you just need to do.

Speaker 2 36:49

Um, and I hide behind it. Now I tell everyone it says it on their certificate you've got a 20 degree angle, you've got a 25 degree angle. My bushcraft knives I put like a 30 degree angle on it, unless stated, they want something different. Um, some of the professional stalkers, like I've said, I've asked for like down to like 16 degrees, which they're happy sharpening almost getting to scalpel area territory, isn't it?

Steel Selection and Edge Retention

Speaker 2 37:16

but, but what? Like yourself up on the hill, all you're actually doing is opening that belly up, pulling that gut content out, taping off the anal tract, cutting off at the back of the liver. Boom it's out, and you're like that's all I've done. I've made a very, very small incision, that's it. I just need a real sharp knife to do that. When I get back to the larder I'll use the larder tools.

Speaker 3 37:39

That's exactly. And you just take the, exactly, we get the saw. We've got knives in the larder generally the knives in the larder. I've got to spend five minutes sharpening because one of the lads is probably wiped over the stainless steel and it's as blunt as anything. But hey, that that's just our life when we get back down there.

Speaker 2 37:55

So yeah it and that's the dirty side to deer stalking in it. That is the the where they say after the shot's taken, the hard work starts. Um, I'm all about, can you reduce that um hard work? And definitely. I mean we'll talk about ireland in a minute, but I mean I've just been in ireland and I ended up caping uh well, skinning 11 seeker and caping one, and I was astonished by how blunt my knife went because of yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 38:33

So so seeker deer, because obviously let's get on to island anyway, because obviously that's uh, that that's kind of where is where my deer stalking started, going out to county wicklow stalking deer. I know you've just been over there and anybody that follows your Instagram feed and social media feeds is going to see that you've been over there stalking some absolutely fantastic deer. Um, go on and sum up seeker deer in about two words, three or five words max they're basically the raw marines of deer, aren't they?

Speaker 3 39:02

they are yeah, totally, I think I think we said it the other day on the phone, aren't they? They are? Yeah, totally, I think I think we said it the other day on the phone, aren't they? If you imagine watching jurassic park and the velociraptors, these deer act in the same way yeah, absolutely I.

Speaker 2 39:13

I or and I don't want to sound an idiot to people I am a good deer stalker. I know I am, I've been told I am my my skill set allows me to be and my results allow that kind of statement. I was absolutely humbled by how switched on seeker are. They are anybody that shoots seeker on a regular basis. I take my hat off to you because they are I. I genuinely think they are one of the hardest animals to stalk. I was. I was like we've got like a 30 mile wind in my face and these seeker hinds have absolutely pinpointed me. In a heartbeat. I was like no way, this just doesn't happen. This does not happen. This evening I've got into a set of row does which I didn't know what they were. We were out stalking reds but we got into a set of row and I got within like 25 meters of them and I was like you ain't got nothing on seeker. No way, no chance exactly.

Speaker 3 40:19

It's like a walk in the park. It's like I heard a sheep standing in a field seeker. You close the car door two miles away. They've heard you and they're.

Speaker 2 40:27

They're off, they're done, they're away I crept around the corner and I was like I had the this christmas tree on my chest and I like crept around as if I was peering around a door. Uh, and I crept around and I just watched this seeker hind literally just spin its head as if I was there, waving this massive flag, and it just go. I was like what? She's just nailed me straight away. What on earth is going on here off? They're gone and they are gone.

Speaker 2 41:01

I was like, yeah, they don't stop wow and I was like the wind is like, so in my favor. What is it? And it? And I was taught once upon a time and I and I never used to kind of believe it that deer have this like sixth sense, that they know something's in the where they're in their vicinity, that they know something's going on, they know something's not quite right and that is enough for them to go. Do you know? I'm out of here, I'm gone. That is me. I have watched too many sisters get shot. I, I am gone. Um, but it's the hinds. It's the hinds that kill you.

Speaker 3 41:38

They they're normally, as I said, I think we're discussing it. You're, you're looking at a stag and he's 100 yards away. The chances are there's a, there's a hind standing in the trees 15 yards in and she's eyeballing you. You don't even have a clue. She's there and you take that one foot step forward and all of a sudden she squeaks and that's it.

Speaker 2 41:58

The place clears out I was like well, richard, you have been done yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 42:04

They're the only deer that get you and it and it is. It's that just at that early morning or last light, and literally that squeak is the most it's blood curdling um, but but like I said to you, uh I I was humbled um.

Speaker 2 42:19

I had a newfound respect um and I haven't shot a lot of seeker um purely because one they're not in my area. I don't know very many people endorse it, but I was actually astonished to see how much um england was covered with seeker. Now I was looking in um one of the british deer society books where they show the um, the national spread of it, and I was like, wow, that is a lot more seeker where I think we always saw it, as they were quite populated in dorset and that dorset area.

Speaker 3 42:53

Now it's very, very wild spreads well, they were dorset, they were up in the highlands, up towards inverness direction and stuff like that, and but now, as you say, they seem to be everywhere.

Speaker 2 43:03

That really has spread out yeah I was astonished. I and I was actually astonished because I've got quite a bit of stalking in oxfordshire and there was seeker there and another member of my syndicate said I heard a whistle a couple of ruts ago and I was like shut up, you clown, stop stop talking crap.

Speaker 3 43:23

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, absolutely but now I'm a little bit like oh, maybe, maybe well, they'll move, they'll travel and they've, because obviously they've got their hybridization. They can hybridize with the reds, but they're the same, they're the same idea as reds. They do travel. They're unlike your row and things like that, that kind of a quite territorial and will. Stay put. The seeker will, will, will, roam and move to find what they want so?

Speaker 2 43:47

so do you reckon, like within the last, and let's say, 20 years, they have expanded tenfold, I would say.

Speaker 3 43:57

I would say the numbers have grown. I don't think it's very difficult. You look at this deer society stuff and like what I look at for our area, there's red population.

Speaker 3 44:07

It's like, no, there's no reds near me, but somebody's spotted a red, so it gets noted down two spottings yeah, exactly, and I know why there's two here, because one of our game keepers let two of them out into the, into the forestry. So of course now we've got a red population and they appear, but it's just, yeah, it's it, it's. It's tricky because you suddenly see this on paper and it comes as a block on the map and all of a sudden it's like there's a population. So it's one of those things we know. We've got reds that come through and they trek through, and and somebody said I've seen a seeker. It's like you sure it was a seeker? Yeah, yeah, it's definitely a seeker. It's like you sure it was a seeker, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's definitely a seeker. It's like or was it just a shitty red that looked a bit like a seeker kind of thing long nose seeker yeah exactly, yeah, but it, it, you never know.

Speaker 3 44:52

But I think I think the numbers are probably growing. But then deer societies say that the numbers of deer throughout the uk are at their highest population ever, anyway yeah, yeah, I mean that that that has to be.

Speaker 2 45:02

I mean, I was told something that I didn't really kind of one believe and another one agree in, and a bloke said to me he said shoot every deer you see in a certain field and see how many deer you shoot out of it. And I was like yeah, I don't know how many, how many robux really can there be?

Speaker 2 45:25

I shot 28 robux at one field this year, right yep and I was like this is astonishing, because I've always kind of been like, well, he's a good robot, we'll leave him go. I've got no stalker to my left, no stalker to my right. It's forestry commission up in front and I own everything at the back um. And I was like, okay, I'm gonna do it and I'd make no bones about it. And I actually said to one of my good friends I was like I ain't gonna see a single hind, a single doe this year because I've shot that many robux um and I said I can't go over how many I've shot out of one field.

Speaker 2 46:03

They just keep coming in and they would go from little spikers to fully mature six pointers, to not so big six pointers, to better six pointers, to another couple of spikers. And I was like this is horrendous, this is you don't realize how many deer are actually sitting on your peripheral yeah, location and you go, gee, how many deer actually are out here. You know, and and the, the british deer society are probably right in how many we've got, because I've shot way more deer um in the last couple of years and that might be because I've left the marines and now do it full time um, but I do think that there is I mean covid's got to have had a massive impact.

Speaker 3 46:49

Oh, I'm sure. I'm sure it has. That's two years where basically the deer population was able to expand. Luckily some of us were able to carry on because obviously I had I had the rights to get out and go shooting. But we to carry on because obviously I had I had the rights to get out and go shooting. But we've seen it, even on the hills where with the reds this year, herds of two, three hundred stags and it's just, it's just crazy and it's you, you think we're shooting. We've shot what? 90 stags this season just on one estate yeah, good uh and it's like that still hasn't really made an indent.

Speaker 3 47:22

But then you get other parts, other estates that they don't shoot on that boundary and they don't shoot here because it's too far out. So the stags know they just roam across there, they're safe, nobody's going to get them, yeah, and and it's okay. So scotland's changed its policies and its laws and we can shoot stags all year round. But, as I say, we've made all the estates around us have basically stopped shooting stags. We've gone to the hinds now, because hinds are population control. But yeah, you've got to take the hinds out now and that that's.

Speaker 2 47:50

That's what does your population yeah, we're the same down here, absolutely, um, I personally would like to see the male males just left alone a little bit. I think that, um, I think from the back of april to august, it's just, it's just not long enough, you know, and people go on about like the fallow, the, the poor head quality of fallow, and I'm like, yeah, but you never let anything grow.

Speaker 3 48:21

No, no, that's it. If it's got a piece of wood on its head, you get shot, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 48:24

yeah, oh, it's a spiker. I'll shoot it because it's a shit spiker and I'm like, well, no, that spiker could actually grow into like a really lovely palmated fallow, if you let it. But but I'm not here to talk about people's ethics, of what they should do or whatnot, but but what I do, especially with the reds, is, if it like. The other night I saw um six males.

Speaker 2 48:50

They were still in like a bit of a bachelor herd, but they were all young animals yeah um, and I saw a spiker with about a foot and a half of of antler and then I seen one with about 11, six inches, six to eight inches maybe, yeah, yeah, and I was like, well, you're a poorer animal next to your brother or your, your cousin or whoever you are, so you're a poorer animal and I think if you can do that on the ground and actually go, do you know what the free deer I've seen this morning that is definitely the worst one Then you are then contributing to some sort of deer management.

Speaker 3 49:27

Well, that's sort of our plan on the hill later on this year, obviously, we'll go out, we'll assess what big stags we've got for next year and then look at the smaller stuff and then in between it anything.

Speaker 3 49:37

That's sort of well, you're a, you're kind of a shitty 10 pointer we'll have you out and we'll have that out, and we'll have that out, and we may shoot another 30 of those out, but at least that way you've taken 30 of the bachelors out. So it's it's 30 less fighting for something. Absolutely it just. It just takes a bit more off off the land, doesn't it? Gives it a bit of chance.

Speaker 2 49:57

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly that um. And do you know what I said to my friend Ryan this evening? Um, I said I hadn't seen a roaring stag roaring this year and I said that that's quite uncommon for me, but the weather that we've had, um, we've had like one day we had it it was like seven degrees, and then the next day it was like 14 degrees, then the next day it was 11 degrees, raining. Uh, we went out on a fairly cold day where it was like nine degrees. We could hear him bellowing in the bottom of the um, in like the bottom of like a like a spinny wood type sketch, and I was like I don't think he's holding hinds, I really don't.

Speaker 3 50:41

We reckon the hinds haven't. They're slow, they were really slow to come in with us. So the stag season's over and now the rut is really kicking off, because the hinds have suddenly come in and you're a month into oh yeah, you're almost two or three weeks into the hind season, and only now is the rut actually really going well, I've got a friend up in scotland and he normally says to me he's in full swing of the rut and then two weeks later down in cornwall our boys will kick off.

Speaker 2 51:10

Yeah so your temperatures drop yeah yeah, because we're we're a little bit late to a thing and I'm sure there might be a uh, a cornwall stalker that will disagree with me. Then that's fine. But I've always said two to three weeks behind the Scotland rut we will start seeing it. And if you're saying now that you're now starting to see it, then I think that we were mega early thinking the rut was on the rut was on.

Speaker 3 51:42

Um, well, I was tuesday, wednesday for me. I was out with a guy and that's when that I put that video up of that stag walking below me, about 50 yards away, and literally the rutting action that was going on there. We had the biggest stags tearing around the place and it's probably the most activity and they were. They were holding better groups of hinds because beforehand we've had like one stag and he's holding all the hinds, but now it's breaking up and it's been coming in pockets because we've had these cold days and it's warmed up again and there's no rhyme or reason with it, but it's just the weather's been so weird.

Irish Sika Deer Hunting Adventures

Speaker 2 52:11

Yeah, and I take it you've had the storm. Have you had the storm up in Scotland like we've had in?

Speaker 3 52:16

Cornwall. So we had a storm probably two or three weeks before that Red weather warning. Rain absolutely annihilated a lot of the glen and caused a lot of damage. We're catching the tail end of what you guys have had down there now, so just rain, but the wind is luckily not with it, so it's not too bad. Well, we?

Speaker 2 52:36

had 100 mile an hour winds down here, but that is nowhere near what I had in Ireland.

Speaker 3 52:44

I was going to say the stuff you get over there, it's just mental. Well, you'd have seen some of the videos I posted. I can get 100 mile an hour winds. You walk up to the top of one of the corries and stand there and almost float.

Speaker 2 52:54

But yeah, what you would have got in Ireland, where you were, would have been, yes, a mental weather there was one day that I looked at the, the lad I went with um who is 70 years old, by the way and I said to him I said, alan, this is ridiculous. I said I have got ward, I've got waterproof trousers on gaiters, on mendel boots, up high top, getting mendel boots. I said, my feet full of water. I said where is all this rain come from? Yeah well, welcome to ireland. Bye, welcome to fucking ireland. I was like jesus christ. I could have jumped in my local harbor and come out drier. I have never experienced rain and wind like that. And they see her, they don't give a shit, mate. They were stood in it just shaking it all off them and I was like what is going on here? This is like, isn't it?

Speaker 3 53:49

it's like the wild west, yeah, yeah, yeah. And just to carry on with that, it's like most people in ireland that the the rifle minimum caliber and things like that. I don't think it has changed and it's still minimum minimum caliber to take a seeker is like a two, at least a two, two, so that's two, two, threes and things like that and two, four, threes. And it's crazy when you look how thick you were saying about skinning them out, you look how thick the necks are on them and you understand now why everybody in ireland realistically only goes for like a neck or a headshot, because I think you had a story of one that that ran on well I?

Speaker 2 54:29

I met up with one of the other syndicate members in the evening and we had a bit of point, so I lived off we lived off grid.

Speaker 2 54:36

It was fantastic, so beautiful. We lived off grid. No, no internet, very little electricity. So when I was in the we'll call it a shower I was in the shower and my friend Alan put the kettle on. It went dark. So so that's the type of electric. We were on. Um it it we had a fire. I used to leave my phone in the in the truck at night. It was fantastic.

Speaker 2 55:04

But it one evening we met up with a, a person called joe, and he said um, I hear you had a deer run on today, richard. And I said I can't believe it. I said I, I come up its shoulder, pull back a tad. Bang pulled the trigger. Deer flipped its legs way above its head at the back, ran with its like shoulders pointing to the ground. Perfect heart, long shot. Um, it ran at least 300 meters and then got to cover. He went. Did you find it? I said I.

Speaker 2 55:40

I stayed on my hands and knees in these thick Christmas tree plantation where I couldn't see three inches in front of me. I said and I finally found it, with its heart totally blown to bits and I was like I just don't understand why they run so hard. I really don't understand it. He went. Well, that's nothing, young man. I shot one like that tonight with a 300 win mag and the bugger still ran. I was like a 300 win mag and he went and I'm firing a 200 grain bullet yeah, I was like jesus christ, I said, and it still went.

Speaker 2 56:17

He said I wouldn't have fed the heart to my dog. He said it was that big to bits. He said that thing probably ran 200 meters, he said, but it ran into open ground so he could see it. And I was like I'm astonished. I'm just so, so astonished. So anybody that thinks about going now what? This is a really good question. Do you think the irish seeker are harder because of the weather, because of the terrain, than the english?

Speaker 3 56:46

seeker, I would say the, the irish seeker, are probably one of the best and the hardest stalks you'll ever do. I think the english seeker are slightly softer, let's just say yeah, yeah, I'm gonna go with that and the amount of pressure they get.

Speaker 3 57:00

In ireland. That's the only other problem, because their season is so short. You see, yeah, their, their season comes in in august and it finishes in february, so everybody over that winter period is out trying to nail everything they can, whereas obviously the uk the stag season is longer and and things like that.

Speaker 2 57:17

Yeah, yeah but I was. I was astonished, absolutely astonished, by the knockdown power that these, these boys could withstand yeah, yeah yeah, I went over in the stag season so the hinds weren't in.

Speaker 2 57:34

Um, I was fortunate enough to shoot three eight pointers, one being a bronze um and that one actually. He didn't run that far, but as I shot he turned and I was like, oh, you shouldn't have done that. That was the worst, that was the worst decision you did. Um, he turned quartering away from me and he just showed me that pocket of his shoulder yeah, and I'm like that was a.

Speaker 2 57:57

That was a bad decision, mate. You should have turned the other way. Um, I squeezed the old 308, we, I was using the 308 gmx's, uh I think the 150 grain coppers. Um bang, and I seen him absolutely rear up and then he went out of sight and alan said to me said, do you think you've hit him hard? I was like if he runs off after that, then I'm putting my rifle away because we need a bigger rifle. And I found him about 50 metres and I found a lovely great big blood trail and some would say that's like a perfect shot in through the back of the left shoulder and out through the front of the right so it's gone through, took heart and lung with it, almost demobilized two shoulders, um, and in some ways for for a big, strong, testosterone filled stag, that's a that.

Speaker 2 58:54

That's the kind of shot, other than a neck or a head shot, and well, we've seen.

Speaker 3 58:58

We've seen seeker stags actually going for it with reds, uh, on the hill over in ireland and and those things.

Speaker 2 59:05

They will, and they're smaller but they stand their ground and they've got the power to hold those reds back yeah I mean, I don't know a lot about seeker, but my seeker, the big one I shot, was 66 kilos in body weight, uh, on the hook. So I would imagine that that's quite a big seeker that's.

Speaker 3 59:25

That's a fair size seeker.

Speaker 2 59:26

Yeah, yeah, exactly because, yeah, it's a beast of an animal to be honest, yeah, I mean, and he had a hell of a mean.

Speaker 3 59:33

Look about him he just it's when they turn and look at you, isn't it? It's like that. The only deer you can ever see that really says I want to do, I'm going to do you damage if I come over there well, he reminded me like of a drill sergeant.

Speaker 2 59:45

That was like are you eyeballing me? Are you looking?

Speaker 2 59:48

are you looking at me in this manner, mate, because there's only going to be one winner here and yeah, totally yeah, he picked the wrong uh boy with a rifle that day, but I mean one of the other Seeker 8-pointers I shot. I was a little bit worried because he wasn't very far away from fit cover and I had a quick assessment of the area and I was like shit the bed. If I heart-lung him, I'm probably not going to see this animal and I decided to go for a high neck shot. Sorry, a high neck shot, I'm sorry, a high shoulder shot.

Speaker 2 1:00:22

So I came up the shoulder and then came into the neck and then drilled it in there, um, and I find that that's got like lots and lots of arteries and, uh, I'm evidently going to hit a spinal cord exactly I'm not going to ruin, uh, the, the back straps in too much of a way, but I didn't want to go into the neck and blow a hole in the neck and just blow his windpipe out or that type of thing. So I was like I'm hitting body, I'm gonna hit, hit hard, I'm gonna demobilize and I'm hopefully and that thing just dropped on the spot, um, just like polaxed, which I was like, and and it's a real weight off your shoulders, especially when you see them and that thing just dropped on the spot, just like polaxed which I was like, and it's a real weight off your shoulders, especially when you see them run that hard.

Speaker 2 1:01:05

And that's a .308, and a lot of boys will go well, a .30 caliber rifle should knock down anything. Well, have a guess what boys it doesn't.

Speaker 3 1:01:14

That's it exactly. A friend of mine shot a big old irish fallow 308 in the neck and the first bullet tracked around the fat in the neck, the second bullet it was like he was chasing across the field and he shot at it and eventually it's three to stop it and it's just like it just goes to show a 308. Even on the reds we've had the 308. It's. It's going all the way through, but you find the bullets just lodged on the backside under the skin. Yeah, and it's just like.

Speaker 3 1:01:42

That's 150 grain, 308, thumping at that and it hasn't actually gone all the way through them. So it's yeah they.

Speaker 2 1:01:50

They deserve a huge amount of respect yeah, yeah, totally which all deer do. Please don't get me wrong. Uh, all deer deserve it, but if, if you hit young muntjac or a Chinese water deer or even a roe, um, they are not going to withstand that type of pressure.

Speaker 3 1:02:08

They are not.

Speaker 2 1:02:09

And it's like I said to you I, I quickly looked at the back of one of the seeker, the big seeker, I caped out and he had at least 10 to 12 mil of leather on his, on his neck, and I was like what on earth is going on here? I said, are these growing? Yeah, so thick? That is a serious, serious, and I don't know if that's just a pretty a evolution to protect them from the cold because of on on that back of their neck and whatnot. I don't. I didn't find their front of their neck as much, but their backs of their neck.

Speaker 3 1:02:42

I was like this is insane this is when you get them, and they're full of fat as well. The irish seekers seem to just that. The fat content in them is absolutely phenomenal well they.

Speaker 2 1:02:52

They managed to turn the most rubbishest of vegetation into fat yeah, yeah extraordinary yeah, and we were discussing this the other day.

Speaker 3 1:03:02

It's um, you find different, the different animals out there, the different heads. If they find a good mineral source and something like that within the forestry, the heads on them. They just grow so much better thick yeah, yeah, yeah just thick it's.

Speaker 2 1:03:19

Um, yeah, I was humbled it. You know anyone, but I tell you what? County wicklow, what a beautiful place you are. It is absolutely beautiful. Anyone that's into the stalking world of the, the experience like like we talked about the other day, the experience on the hill, experiencing that weather, experiencing the hard work getting up and down it, experience in the wind and the conditions. Then the stalk comes into place, then the growlick comes into place, then the drag back comes into place. County Wicklow is as beautiful as they come, but as mean and as harsh as a wild wind oh, absolutely it can.

Speaker 3 1:04:09

It can be, it can be beautiful and sunny, and then you shoot something in the wrong place and you've got to drag it uphill to get back to where you're going well, I shot.

Speaker 2 1:04:17

I shot one of my, it was one of one of one of the other eight pointers, quite a distance from the truck and I turned around to to alan and I said um well, we got two options, alan. I went either I put this as a backpack and we backpack out and we stalk some kind of way out. Uh, I went. I don't know how good that's gonna be, because I've now got a 60 kilo deer on my back. Um, well, probably more 60 kilos, but 60 odd kilos on my back, which I said I'm happy to do. I said, or I've looked on the map and we go 500 meters down through fixed vegetation and we get cut to hell on christmas trees and brambles and brash. And we go 500 meters down through fixed vegetation and we get cut to hell on christmas trees and brambles and brash, and we hit a major track. And he said well, what would you like to do, young man, because I'm not dragging this dear you are?

Speaker 2 1:05:11

oh, fantastic yep, and I said well, I said I suppose the question is is do you want to follow or stalk? Yeah, and he turned around and went. I think we should stalk. I went and I thought you would say that. So I backpacked this bloody seeker about a mile and a half while we attempted to furmore and look and assess and we were still seeing deer. We were still seeing, yeah, and I said to him, I said you shoot one. Now I said you've got, you've got to come into the fold, you've got to come into this bit of the scenario. Because I said because I can't take two, I said oh, we got to come back and he was like no, we'll leave that one, we'll leave that one. That's not good enough, that's, we'll leave that one.

Speaker 2 1:05:53

I was like god almighty, I hope he keeps saying we'll leave him because this, this deer is getting wetter, it's getting heavier, um, but nah, unbelievable, so privileged to have gone um to be a guest over there. Um, I've now sent that deer to the taxidermy, to a bloke called steve brown, up in um st helen's way. Uh, he, he's done one for me already. I think he deserves a good mention um, and he said to me he said this is a cracker, mate, this is a real cracker. He said you didn't shoot this in england, did you? I said no, no, I shot it in ireland. And he said, well, well done you, mate. He said this is, this is a fantastic animal. He said this is the best seeker. Um, that's not a high metal quality, um, that's not a high-medal quality. That's come through here. He's got beautiful genes, lovely and symmetrical, real thick tines and I was like, yeah, I feel very privileged, I feel very privileged to have had the opportunity to shoot it.

The Crew Membership Community

Speaker 3 1:06:51

I think the Seeker, because obviously they were originally. They were taken over to the Guinness estate and that's where they've escaped from, so there's nothing really that's mixed around with them. They they are still the same genome that were taken over there and you can tell that because the quality of the animal over there, compared to the stuff you see being shot in this country or scotland, it's completely different well, I was speaking to the, the bloke who actually invited us over there, and I was saying there seems to be a huge amount of stacks.

Speaker 2 1:07:24

Um, I said I also I'm seeing I mean, bearing in mind we're in the rut I'm seeing like big eight pointers just tolerating spikers and tolerating four pointers, six pointers and other eight pointers. And he went there's that many deer over here. They don't compete. They really don't really compete against each other, he said. He said when you get a big boy, he said, like, like what you said. He said you won't find another big stag like him. He said you might find the odd cricket or whatnot in around the peripherals. He said, but you won't find another big boy because he won't tolerate him.

Speaker 2 1:08:04

Um, and I was like what I also noticed is, um, and the whistling or the bugling or whatever you want to call it. That's quite new to me. Um, and I noticed the harder we bugled, it blew and it pushed the younger animals away and there was a couple of days where we were bugling quite hard because they were bugling in the, the thick in the wood and we were having this like mexican standoff. I was like. I was like we are very different to, to our red deer, because, oh deer, you'd be out here now going.

Speaker 2 1:08:40

Come on, then, let's have it, let's have this out, yeah, but they don't seem to fight like and it might be that I just didn't witness it and they might do it, but I saw I saw it more than once Younger, like, like, maybe not beamed animals, or very small beamed animals. They would be running when I whistled hard. And I was like Hmm. I was like maybe we should whistle a little bit softer. And Alan was like why, why, why do you think that I went just whistle a bit softer, let's go a bit softer?

Speaker 3 1:09:15

And we moved to like another area and I and we whistled a bit softer and it was the first time then we had an interaction from a smaller animal. Yeah, because it's like I'm gonna, I can have this, whereas if you're a big, big animal, it's like, well, I'll just, we'll get away out of here because, as you say, you're whistling across the valley to a bigger one on the other side. He's whistling back and it is, it's one of those things. Is he going to come in? And you just you're waiting and waiting, and and you're trying to wait and see whether something comes to you, and sometimes it doesn't.

Speaker 3 1:09:41

They just keep whistling yeah, very, very mysterious, very mysterious creatures just very well that that's where they get the name the ghost of the forest, isn't it? At the end of the day, they're there. They're always watching you. But yeah, that is it. As, as anybody that's thinking about it, that is the place to go and stalk Seeker, definitely.

Speaker 2 1:10:01

Yeah, absolutely, it's an experience. And do you know what? And I'm going to say that the travel from me I live down in Cornwall and I stalked quite a bit up in Inverness Shire For me to drive from Newquay to Hollyhead and get across on the ferry and then down to County Wicklow is under 400 miles yeah you know and and and I.

Speaker 2 1:10:30

That's a fair travel. Someone might go Jesus Christ, but let me tell you this for me to drive from Newquay to Inverness Shire I'm looking at like 770 miles and a 16 hour trip because the country roads up there are like Cornwall. Yeah, yeah, and it's opened my eyes that actually. Do you know what? You can get over to Ireland a lot quicker and a lot easier than you probably think. And if you can, and realistically, if you're not going to apply for a irish hunting license like I didn't, I used an estate rifle yeah, you can fly straight from like newky to dublin for about 40 quid yeah, yeah, yeah, totally, because I I used to drive.

Speaker 3 1:11:14

Well, I used to live in leicester and we just used to drive to hollyhead and the cross, so no problem, it was like three, four hours tops. But now, obviously, when I used to travel down from scotland, it's always take the midnight ferry. But you're looking at the best part of, yeah, 400, 500 miles just to get to holyhead and then midnight ferry 8 am arrive, another hour and a half to get to where we used to stand out on the hill by about 10 o'clock in the morning.

Speaker 2 1:11:37

Brilliant, isn't it absolutely, and the and the ferry crossing cost me 250 odd quid and that was to pay and I went in the, the, the part, the private lounge as well. I thought I'd go a bit posh. Oh, you had the posh bit I, I don't get the cheap economy and sleep on the sofa by the window on the ferry well, to be honest, if I ever go again, that's what I'll do, because all I actually did is just fell asleep yeah, that's it, it's uh that.

Speaker 3 1:12:04

That's why for us, it was always the the latest ferry you could get, the midnight ferry, because it was always quiet, we always had firearms and it was easy because you just rock up at the port straight through, have a chat with the bobbies at uh, at customs I ended up it's always the chief of police always ended up managing to talk to me. He'd tell me what was about the shooting up, um, the shooting ranges and everything he used to do get on the ferry, get off, no issues at all, and in ireland coming back, it was just as much of a doddle really. Yeah well.

Speaker 2 1:12:34

Well, my little downfall was I obviously have got my business. I had Richie Nank's knives written across the back and that obviously drew a little bit of attention to the custom people and they were like, oh so have you been over here selling knives or buying knives or something? I was like, uh, no, neither we've been over hunting, explained it and do you know what? They were fantastic about it because we said, well, we, we come to Ireland to use your facilities, your hospitality, your beautiful countryside, your stalking, we put money into your community. And they were like that's fantastic. And there are these city folk really live, probably live in Dublin, but Dublin City, and they were fine with it. They were like, oh, wow. And the Alan who I was with and I don't want to go too much because I don't know how much he wants me to really kind of publicize but he's been a deerstalker, he's 70 years old now, so he's been a deerstalker for best part of 50 years.

Speaker 2 1:13:37

Um, he taught most of the irish community of deerstalkers their dsc level one he's you know, he came over and he introduced the dsc level one and introduced it into ireland. They then adopted it for a certain period and he's made this like massive community with them and it's it's oh it's almost like it's his own little palace, it's his own little paradise over there, because they've got this kind of huge setup with the amount of deer they've got, but they haven't got like the industry, like England has.

Speaker 2 1:14:14

They haven't got that, and it is very different. Um, I think acquiring ground over there is quite relatively easy, I think. As long as you've got an Irish speaking accent, you walk up to the farmer, and as long as you're not a tinker, I think it's all good.

Speaker 3 1:14:32

Everybody knows everybody, especially in County Wicklow. You literally rock up and you'd mention somebody's name that you know somebody else and I have to find you crack on Off. You go by the down, by the trees I saw a deer down there yesterday kind of thing and I don't think I'm out of turn saying that I think it genuinely, it's genuinely true.

Speaker 3 1:14:49

That's how we got our land over there, literally. I knew I knew a guy went over. We ended up with I think I said to you about 500 acres in about half an hour there you go, you wait after this podcast. People will be just getting flights and don't bloody tell them how to get landing island. That's you'll be. You'll be kicked off air yeah yeah, yeah, totally, but.

Speaker 3 1:15:09

But it has changed over there now. Obviously, when we started going there, there were no real big outfitters doing it and there are guys that have started up and it's such a small world, you know them all. But Irish Seeker seemed to be the thing that come up more and more and you've got a lot of Scandinavian and foreign guests want to go over and go after Irish Seeker now. So, yeah, all fair play to them. It's another outlet and especially with the way that, well, the game dealer market and everything else in there changed, so it gives them something to do, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 1:15:43

yeah, I. I think, if I'm not mistaken, they get. They're getting about 180 a kilo over there at the moment. But they're um, they're, they're a little, and I'm gonna say this I think they're a little bit more stringent on carcass damage.

Rifle Choices and Ammunition Debates

Speaker 3 1:15:57

Yeah, they've got. They've got tighter on it. Definitely, because I remember going to one of the game dealers over there when we presented ours. The guy looked and went did you do this? And it's like, yeah, he goes. I'll show you some of the quality we get. And when he looked he was just. It was yeah, just our skill set compared to what they were getting originally. Almost like the, as I say to you, can a grolick with a spoon and you're just like what did they do?

Speaker 2 1:16:20

drag it through a river as well at the same time yeah, but I think they're trying to uh up that standard over there yeah, but they had, they had, yeah, and they had a process for everything, even all the skins.

Speaker 3 1:16:32

It was like what's going on with that? Oh, we've got an outlet for those, so there was nothing in their process actually being wasted, which was really good, fantastic fun, yeah, fantastic.

Speaker 2 1:16:42

Um, something I would like to um bring up. It is uh, about my knives, is and I call and I and it's a bit of a gimmick, but it's not um, I call it the crew membership. Um, so when you buy a knife off me, I kind of in inadvertently add you to my like crew membership. Um, and and a prime example happened tonight I was out stalking with my friend ryan. I went listen to this and it was two blokes that don't know each other that became friends because they brought my knife each right. I then said you two have got the same postcode. You live quite close to each other, do you two need friends? Um, and it's a little bit like that military ethos of sticking a pack together, being tight together.

Speaker 2 1:17:38

My wife explains me sometimes as being a little bit of and I don't know the right word what a male version of a feminist is, but I'm very male orientated, like brothers have got to look after each other. We've got to look after each other. And I had a message off two blokes tonight and they were like we're out tonight We've shot a fallow buck and a fallow hind, a fallow doe. Um, knives working brilliantly, mate, I hope you hope you're well, and I was like, and nine times out of ten all I send back is a thumbs up or a good lad, good effort lads. But I've created this like and I'm trying to create and it is taking off, but it isn't quite there yet.

Speaker 2 1:18:22

I'm trying to create this like community where people just fucking get on I just get on, um, and and there are a lot, of, lot of things, and I've had people ring me and go can I speak to you? And I'm quite big into the mental health side of things because of my background and whatnot and I've had blokes ring me and go. You're the only bloke that will listen to me and I've said yes, mate, yeah, of course, what's up, mate? At the shooting show last year I had a lady come up to me with a bloke and I didn't recognise him. Show last year I had a lady come up to me with a bloke and I didn't recognize him, um, but she said I want to thank you because without you, I wouldn't have had him and I went oh really, she said he talks about this crew that he's in and it's a it's imaginary crew, and I went well, it is.

Speaker 2 1:19:12

Yeah, it's kind of really. We're not like biker gangs walking around with like patches and stuff. Yeah, yeah, but he said he had the audacity, he had the courage to speak to you at his lowest and and I need to tell people this like and it's not as I don't care if you don't have one of my knives, if you're struggling out there, um, there is someone that will listen, there is somebody that is willing to pick up the phone, because I have, unfortunately, had to experience way too many boys that don't pick up the phone. So I've created this like crew membership and it's working and I think that's a real and it is a bit of a gimmick. And it is a bit of a gimmick, um, but some boys don't think it's a gimmick.

Speaker 2 1:20:01

They wear my hoodies now and my mum said she's seen someone in asda the other day wearing one of my hoodies and I was like I've not sold a hoodie to anybody locally and it was a bloke down on holiday and I put a little message out on instagram and he went. I'm staying in mevergizzy. Your mum must have seen me and I was like that's ace.

Speaker 2 1:20:21

I love that that's really good thing, but my mum went up and spoke to him and she went. That's my son's company, that's my son's business. She went and he went. Well, mrs nankara, then I need to give you some love, and she was delighted, she was absolutely over the moon with it. You know, um, fantastic, yeah, and and I don't want to dwell, and hopefully we're not going to end now- but no, no, no, not at all.

Speaker 3 1:20:43

Yeah, actually, just touching back on that, it really is important because we have obviously had a bit of a tragedy up in the glen as well and um, a situation that if the guy had, we don't know what the situation was, but if he had actually been able to talk to somebody, he may still be us. One of our gillies took his life. Yeah, and I think it's really important. You've touched on it and us, as blokes who are listening to this, we all have that. We were all taught as kids not to cry and show emotion.

Speaker 3 1:21:13

Female listeners they go and talk to their mates and they get on with it and they talk about stuff. But us guys have been told you've got a man up and get on with it and actually, realistically, in this day and age, if there is a problem or you've got something that you need to speak to, just pick up the phone. People will talk, people will take the time to listen to what you've got to say and it's super important. And actually I think a lot of guys worry that they're going to say something and somebody's going to go oh, I'm going to take you, I'll report you and your guns are going to go and stuff like that. No, just talk about it, just just five minutes on the phone. It's five minutes of your mental capacity that suddenly you're, you've got your head clear and actually you can crack on and keep going absolutely, absolutely.

Speaker 2 1:21:55

I I've, I've walked this path and I tell you what I would give up my guns for a century to never go back, to feel in a state where you're like, do you know what? This is a shit place to live, uh, and and you know what? The nature of my job kind of went hand in hand with that, um. But I, I speak to some people like and I and I always ask how are you doing, mate, are you okay? It, there should never be a conversation that doesn't start with how are you, are you okay?

Speaker 3 1:22:28

yeah, yeah and it was quite interesting because I had three lads out on the hill the beginning of this week and we were discussing something because they didn't know and they'd been stalking up there for like 12, 13 years and they didn't, they hadn't been told that obviously our ghillie had gone and and he said we have a good one, that we phone friends up and we asked them, on a scale of like one to ten, how are you this week? And if they give you a, an eight the first week, but then you phone them the next week after he goes a three, he goes well, last week you're an eight why are?

Speaker 3 1:22:54

you three this week, talk to me and it's just such a simple thing. Yeah, you can suddenly actually, it's an icebreaker in it you could crack on with it. Anyway, let's move on from that. Let's not dwell on the past. Is there, get people to talk about it and and stuff like that. Now, um, I had something and, ah, you asked on social media. Did anybody have any questions or anything? So go on.

Speaker 2 1:23:19

Nobody came to me, so uh, let's see what you've got no okay well, other than get a haircut, you scruffy fucker. Uh god, you look like john wick. Uh, lots of insults I had about. I had about 25 insults. Um, one of the biggest ones and this is a huge one was what is the art of sharpening a blade? Okay, yeah, what? What is the fundamental rules to sharpening a knife? Now I'm going to speak about my knives. When you buy a knife off me, I give you the details to go out and buy, let's say, a 60 quid sharpening tool like a lansky yep and I give you the parameters because I put a 20 degree edge on it so that lansky can put a 20 degree edge back on that knife.

Speaker 2 1:24:12

Um, you watch one of my quick videos on instagram about how you do it and setting up things and what will make it just that little. I'm all about taking away the one percents. If you take away five one percents, then you've got five percent better quality, absolutely so. So the art of sharpening and I say this to a lot of my lads that that buy my knives and they go, I can't quite get it, uh, hair shaving or I can cut paper, but nowhere near like what you can in some of your videos and I always say to them get or use a tormec and I should genuinely be sponsored by tormec because the amount I have sold for them that they owe me something a tormec wheel if you don't know, please google it um, but it's a rotating stone wheel, um, on a motor, um, with an angle bar that allows you to put a knife at a certain degree. You use a little um like instrument to measure the angle and once that's all set up, um, what I say to them to do is to go 10 strokes, singular on each side.

Speaker 2 1:25:23

Um, and what that should do is very similar, like where a butcher will go down a steel, yeah, but but it's a bit more coarse, so it's putting that edge back into the knife. Now you have two things to do now. Once you've gone 10 side, 10 on each side, you could do eight if you want. If it's already sharp, you're looking to find that burr. If there's a burr on one side, then have a guess what everything's. You've got the leaning tower of pisa on your knife, yeah you need to straighten that up.

Speaker 2 1:25:58

And what I say to them to do is, once they get to like if they're doing 10, once they get to like six, it's very, very light and you're just touching and through the stone, um, then once you feel both sides of the edge, you're looking. So, yeah, I cannot feel an edge on each side. I don't have a lot of hair on my hands anymore. Uh, equally so because I use it as a tester, but in some ways the knife shouldn't actually be cutting hair now.

Speaker 2 1:26:31

Then you put it on the turning. The other side of it has got a rotating lever strop right. Then you put it on there and you do like a soaring motion where it's back and forth, back and forth. Then you turn it over three on each side, then two on each side, then one on each side, and then you put it onto like a lever strop where you're using it like a john wayne belt type. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, then go and see and if you can cut through paper, then have a look at the paper and see how clean that cut is. I have cut lots of paper and I'm like that's not sharp enough it's people you feel it's snagging on the paper.

Speaker 2 1:27:10

You're right, you're absolutely right, mate, and you will see the jaggedness of it and what it does is that that, that that edge just needs honing a little bit more to take away. Imagine, like um, like your heartbeat, where it goes up and down in a rhythm and you see that's like what your edge is looks like under a million times magnification, or something like that oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah and it's amazing.

Speaker 3 1:27:38

It's just the leather strop and that little bit of compound on it. That's enough just to clean that up and put that mirror finish on it.

Speaker 2 1:27:45

Basically, yeah, absolutely um, and and if, if you've ever come and seen me at the shooting show or the the stalking show, you will see me demonstrating, demonstrating, and there isn't many times that I don't get a wow, whoa, you've done that so quick, wow. And bearing in mind, I do this daily, so it's, it is what it is. Um, I mean, I couldn't plaster, and if I walked, someone watched in and started plastering my walls, I'd be like this motherfucker can work. Good, look at this.

Speaker 3 1:28:17

I couldn't do this yeah, they're totally, absolutely that's it, but it's. It's one of those things, isn't it? Once you get the skill. I always remember the old boy it was um, it was one of the shows and it was something like that. He had a it was a compound and a paste and a leather strap and and it was just that's really cool and you think how he does it that way and it's just well, there you go, it's just it, yeah absolutely so.

Speaker 2 1:28:39

So so we've got the knife really, really sharp. And then, ultimately, it's about the feel of it, um, and you will know. You will know when it's sharp, like I know, when I'm pushing it up and down a lever strop, I'm like this feels good, because there's no. You can sometimes feel a little bit of tension in it, um, and, like you say, put a bit of what they call it um smurf's poo uh which is it's blue.

Speaker 2 1:29:06

I rub that into my leather sheaths and whatnot. Um, but any kind of oil or any kind of compound of some sort is going to be better than nothing, like they say in like the mechanical world, or, dirty oil is better than no oil. Is is a in your engine of your car.

Speaker 3 1:29:23

At least it's got something to lubricate. It hasn't exactly yeah, um.

Speaker 2 1:29:27

So once you've got that type of sketch, um, and if it's shaving on the back of your hand or it's cutting through paper, lovely that is. That is like that's enough. The more you take off and the more you put in that there's a very fine line of going from uber sharp to dull and it can go there quite quickly. Um or, I have no problems. When I'm out in the field, especially if I've shot multiple deer, I've got a little steel and a leather strop in the back of my truck. I have no problems of just putting nice and gently and controlled I'm not talking like a Spanish waiter trying to cut, freaking whatever type of meat you know but nice and controlled and it's just straightening that edge. That will remove no metal but it will straighten and align your edge. That you've already got, and sometimes that's what a butcher is doing, it's just realigning his edge yeah, so.

Speaker 3 1:30:28

So similar to, like you say, the steel, I've got one of those little like a butterfly diamond file a thousand. Grip that in a leather, slap you just a couple of strikes on that beautiful over the leather case and you're back to razor sharp crack on yeah, and that is.

Speaker 2 1:30:43

That is the art and people shouldn't and I say this for all knife smiths, so I'll stand together with them. Just because your knife goes dull or blunt, it doesn't mean the knife is bad. It means that it's probably done a lot of work and it's your job to get that knife back to it, exactly same as if you've knocked your rifle or you've banged your zero out or whatnot.

Speaker 3 1:31:08

It's your job to get that rifle shooting straight again oh, totally, and I think anybody that thinks a knife will stay sharp forever. Yeah, it doesn't. You get a stanley knife blade. You use it. It goes dull because you cut things that probably shouldn't cut. You put a new blade in it. You've bought this expensive knife. It's if you use it and you use it correctly, it will go dull. It needs sharpening it will do.

Speaker 2 1:31:32

And again it comes back to that custom side that I'm. That I really promote is is the knife tailored for you? Is that knife tailored for you to use correctly? Are you good enough to use that knife correctly and are you using it correctly? So if you're ticking only one of them boxes, then there's a cross in the others. So that's um, that's something to take into consideration as well is the use and abuse that it gets, if you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 1:32:03

No, absolutely yeah. So, just firing on. Have you got any other questions on there that you got in?

The Art of Knife Sharpening

Speaker 2 1:32:12

Knife care was knife care. So I really promote K-Deck sheaths, uh, plastic. Um, purely from the hygienic side, where you can, you can stick them in the washing, uh the dishwasher uh, not a boiling, not a boiling wash.

Speaker 3 1:32:33

But otherwise it just turns into a flat piece of K-Dex again.

Speaker 2 1:32:36

Well, it does. Yeah, you have to remould it then, but you can get some food hygiene water in there or soap in there and whatnot, and you can get it in there when a leather sheaf not so much you know. But it all comes back to. Are you that stalker that goes out? Once on a Saturday you shoot one deer for your chiller and your home butchery absolutely fine, you wipe. You carry in wipes with you and you wipe your knife down, you dry it off, you put it back in your leather sheath. Lovely, you stick a a filthy knife back in a leather sheath.

Speaker 2 1:33:09

Have a guess what you are harboring bacteria oh yeah, yeah, yeah, and you take that knife out of that harbored bacteria leather sheaf and go and then shoot your other deer three weeks later. Yeah, you, you can keep that venison buddy because I don't want to be eating it because, uh, it's not great. But you get the traditional people that are like no, I like a leather sheaf. And I do like a person that likes a leather sheaf because it's got a little bit more meaning to it. But leather work is my absolute nemesis. I I would rather go and run a 40 miler than the leather work. I don't know what it is, because it's actually quite easy.

Speaker 3 1:33:49

But I just it's. It's just one of those things everybody has that you, you make the knives, but that that's what I did. I started making my knives and I bought my leather sheaths in because, actually, do you know what?

Speaker 2 1:33:59

it was far easier if I if I could get someone that would quite aptly work for like six quid an hour and make me leather sheaths. I pay them and I probably give them double time at some point. But I am trying my hardest to get better at leather sheaves and I think I'm. But also, again, it comes down to cost. Leather is extremely expensive. Yeah, and I want to appeal to the working man that maybe doesn't need it, doesn't require it, doesn't really do like that. Why am I spending 65 quid on a leather sheaf? Stick it in a six quid plastic one more than exactly yeah, and for what?

Speaker 3 1:34:44

what, actually? Unless you're going to be showing off down the pub, which you're not allowed to do anymore anyway, then there's no point in really having it, is there?

Speaker 2 1:34:52

no, um, however, um, I do admire some leather work. I really do. There's some. There's some boys in ireland I don't know his's, some. There's some boys in ireland I don't know his name, but there's a boy in ireland that is doing some really beautiful leather work and I'm like fair play mate, but that's all he does. He doesn't make knives, he just does, and he's selling leather sheaths for like 100 euros and I was like bloody, bloody hell, you can buy a bloody knife off me for not much more than that you know the leather work is is something.

Speaker 3 1:35:22

It's phenomenal when you look at some of the work they put into it yeah, yeah, um, so definitely.

Speaker 2 1:35:29

Um. The other question I was asked was um venison sales, um, which I think is really um pertinent at this time of the like post, like era that we're in at the minute, with game dealers not giving great money, and they have a reason for not giving that. If you home butcher and you put all your waste in a bucket and go and weigh a roe deer and weigh what you retain from a roe deer, yeah, you can understand where the loss of those pounds are. I really can. I, I, I empathize with them. However, I'm a registered food business. That um, I do all my home butchery um, I do put deer into the food chain via a game dealer because there's only so many deer I can process. Um, but I am managing and I say this very loosely I am managing to turn, let's say, a 17 kilo red roe deer into 130 quid, 140 um, with a little bit of hard work. Yes, I've got a chiller. Yes, I've got a kitchen set up. Yes, I'm but the registered food businesses.

Speaker 3 1:36:45

But look at it like the um, like home cake ladies that make you're allowed to do 80 beast a year, or something like that, is it?

Speaker 2 1:36:53

I don't even think it's got a number on it, not really because I haven't seen a number, but I said I I am not going to require a bin for waste I am not going to require x, y and z because I'm not doing it on that scale.

Speaker 2 1:37:09

Any bones and hide and excess meat that I get will go back out onto the ground sporadically, which will feed badgers, foxes, rodents, crows, all the the praised birds of prey, etc. And the lady from cornwall council was like that that's really refreshing to hear that actually you're not just going to send it to landfill. That's actually really refreshing. Um, however, a game dealer establishment, I would imagine, is very different.

Speaker 3 1:37:39

Um you know I think there's been a big issue with we're talking to guys down there that the game dealers are. Now most of them only want head and neck shot. Yes, because minimal wastage.

Speaker 2 1:37:50

They can get more out of the carcass without having to think about I've got to chuck the shoulders away, or something like that well, yeah, I mean, I'm a big, big fan of a back lung shot, um, and uh, one, because I have a tracking dog, that's pretty good. Yeah, two, I have full confidence in the ammunition that I use. Um, I don't take risks, so that's. That reduces a lot, um, and you know what?

Speaker 2 1:38:22

I find wrecking about six ounces of rib meat a lot more better than actually shoulders yeah, there's quite a bit of meat on a neck of said yeah um, however, you are right um, a neck and a head shot is much more desirable than a shoulder shot to to a game dealer.

Speaker 3 1:38:45

Yeah, but it it's now put in what, how do I put it? I think the the game dealers down in england now, with this head and neck shot policy it's putting gonna put out there a lot more risky shots and a lot more animals running around with jaws blown off. And I think you said you use copper. There's already two of the manufacturers of copper bullets have turned around and up it for us. Anyway. We've had, uh, up here no neck shots because we've had ricochets off. We've had guys taking front on neck shots on the hill.

Future Plans and Acknowledging Supporters

Speaker 3 1:39:18

That would have been fine with a lead bullet, but the copper bullets bouncing off the vertebrae and I think one of the keepers actually on the balmoral estate was telling me about this. Um, next shot that his that deer went down. The one next to it suddenly dropped because it had been shot in the eye. Both deer weren't dead and you're just like, well, that's just, that's mental. So they, they've basically turned around. If you're going to use copper on the hill, it's engine room shots, but yeah it's crazy really well, I had a.

Speaker 2 1:39:47

I shot a seeker in the chest with uh 150 green, uh gmxs and I went to pin it in the shoulder and it went out through the liver yep yeah, yeah, like that animal was not quartering on that much to me and that hit shoulder blade, ricocheted down and went down and and luckily enough, went out through, mashed the liver to bits and went out through like the 11th, 12th rib. Whatever it is on a seeker.

Speaker 3 1:40:16

It's crazy, though, isn't it really, that we've gone? I know this this go. This is a whole nother topic. We can go into but it's.

Speaker 3 1:40:23

It's that thing that we've, we, I think you've, obviously you, you've adopted copper. We're still very much on the hill. We want the animals down. We're still going with lead. Our game dealer doesn't care. I know that a 308, 150 grain Hornaday round bump that's dropping on the spot, not got to worry. We've. We've had too many. This year. We had one guy came up with copper and I think three shots to drop a stag. Wow, three shots, three copper, 308 rounds and it still didn't go down. And you're just like. This is just mental yeah is that trouble is.

Speaker 2 1:40:58

I have heard people say before um, and this might be a bit of experience for both of us. The second shot is actually creating more testosterone and um drive for that animal to keep going, quite possibly.

Speaker 3 1:41:13

But if you look at these, you look at these stags that we did. This boy shot with copper and he turned around. He went. Last year I came up here with lead, no problem, I've moved over to copper because I thought it was the way that needed to go and I've never had this situation. And you, as you say, yeah, first shot pins in its shoulder, the stags, like I've just been hit where I'm getting riled up. I'll go again. The next shot I've been hit again, I'm still going and hopefully the third shot puts it down. But yeah, it's just, it's not what you want to see on the hill. Let's just say that no, it's not.

Speaker 2 1:41:46

Um, no, um. What was the other question? Uh, what rifles am I shooting? And ammunition, which I think is quite pertinent. So I shoot a blazer.

Speaker 3 1:41:57

Right.

Speaker 2 1:41:58

I love it. I think it's a very safe weapon. I'm teaching my son my youngest son, who is now 15, weapon safety, correct way of entering and dismantling, disembarking a high seat, and I think that a Blaser I'm not disputing any other weapon won't do the same, but I think the Blaser system where I say, pass me the trigger, it takes the trigger out. And if I hear a where the safety catch comes off, we then have a conversation that normally ends up in press-ups, um, over why are you walking around with a safety catch on which I will say doesn't, hasn't happened, um, but it's a safety feature that is, uh, is there in place.

Speaker 2 1:42:50

I like the uncock system of it, where you just pull the lever back a tad, it's uncocked, um, but everything is still structurally to the same instead of lifting a bolt. I don't know if lifting a bolt is the right thing. I also don't like pushing a safety catch on to lift the bolt, um, and that's just because my weapon systems I've grew up with in the military. You don't need to do that yeah, it's one of those things.

Speaker 3 1:43:17

They're certain, right. As I say, I shoot an old tk m65 and to disengage the bolt you have to take the safety off. However, I've got a seiko where you can leave the safety on. Yeah, you can disengage the bolt. Having shot a few blazers on the hill this year taking them off, clients that have cocked up a shot or something like that. It it's just what I still. I've watched them and it's that pushing the safety off and I've always thought that that safety catch can seem a bit awkward sometimes well, I've actually had it explained to me that it's not actually a safety catch.

Speaker 2 1:43:52

We know it as a safety catch, but it's actually like a loading mechanism. It's actually okay. It's not actually a safety catch. We know it as a safety catch, but it's actually like a loading mechanism. It's actually okay, it's actually pre-loading the firing pin.

Speaker 3 1:44:02

Yeah, because that that's why it's so awkward, and pushing up to get the red spot is actually putting the firing pin.

Speaker 2 1:44:08

Okay, that makes more sense yeah, so you're actually pre-loading the, the which, let's be honest, it is a safety catch because it won't work without that being forward, so so, it is, but it's a pre-loading mechanism where a safety catch on a normal bolt rifle is will allow the trigger to work.

Speaker 2 1:44:27

Yes, which? Yes, which is different. So I shoot a six point five Creedmoor and I'm not gay, just call you know which is cool? I shoot a hundred and twenty seven grain Barnes LRX and I'm really passionate about this round, about this round. Um, I did extensive uh testing with it. Um, before I really shot a deer with it when I went over, I used to use sierra game kings, which I loved um, which I absolutely loved. Um, I actually shot a couple of rodos. Uh, late in the season when I went, when I kind of done all my velocity checks and making sure I was getting the right um feet per second, I shot into um an ibc container to make sure I was getting expansion at various ranges. So I went from 100 to 200 to 300 um and I was like, okay, so I can tell that this round and the reason I use an lrX and it stands for long range expansion is it expands at 300 meters like a TTSX does at 100 meters.

Speaker 3 1:45:44

Oh, right, ok, yeah. So even with the drop off of velocity, you're still getting the same expansion out of it, still getting the same expansion.

Speaker 2 1:45:52

Um, especially if you are, I've got a muzzle velocity of around the 2850 feet per second, which in a in a medium caliber rifle like the creedmoor? Um, you've got to have a fairly long barrel to get anything more I was gonna say yeah yeah, uh, I'll shoot a 20 inch barrel. I think if you were to go to like a 24 or a 26 I don't know if they do a 26, but they probably do um you would then probably get up around the 3000 feet per second.

Speaker 2 1:46:25

Definitely two, nine, um, which, again, it's gonna work, it's gonna work oh, yeah, yeah um, what I was getting is I was shooting these row and they weren't reacting and I was like what, what's going on? And they take two steps and do a backflip right and I was like whoa, that's, that animal has just been almost polaxed in its, but it hasn't done anything. And I was growling these deer and I tell you what I never seen damage like it. Um, but what I did like about it is was the near enough 99.9 percent bullet retention was what? Something I was really I was like okay, so.

Speaker 2 1:47:12

So then I moved on to some fallow and I shot some fallow in oxfordshire, um, in a woodland environment, under the hundred meters, and again, these, these animals were just polaxing on the spot. And I was like ragnar, you're going to be made redundant here in a minute. My, my tracking dog, yeah, I was like right, well, the big test is what? What can it do to red deer? What will red deer withstand? Um, I shot some calves first which absolutely polaxed. I shot a couple of hinds which reacted in a way they they knew they'd been hit, but they just like ran and then stopped and then just fell over, or they would just stand still, like as if I'd gut shot them. And I was like oh, oh god, what have I done? Do I shoot him again? Oh god what? And it was all a little bit new, this like new scenario of how bullets are reacting to to or how deer are reacting to the bullet. And in the end I I was like do you know what I'm? I'm slowly falling in love with copper.

Speaker 2 1:48:15

I'm really like um, but I do think it's because I've got the right bullet doing the right velocity, doing the right species and and I am putting it 99 times out of 100 in that engine room block, which I think is the key yes, and if I clip a shoulder, I'm still creating enough philosophy, philosophy or velocity, um to do damage. Yeah, but I was finding on the reds, I was finding the bullets underneath the jacket yeah, and it's phenomenal.

Speaker 3 1:48:50

When you, well, we took a, what was that? 129 kilo larder weight, stag off the hill the shoulders on that thing, it's just like, yeah, the bullet was just wedged, it hadn't even passed through, but that was a 308 again and it just just phenomenal. You, you've got to drive that bullet through it and and I think tom uses 127 grain, 308 round and I'm a 150. He's a faster and flatter but they do the job, but we, we would.

Speaker 3 1:49:22

We discussed it. I'd rather. I'd rather the client hit it with something that at least a bad shot gonna drop it. Yeah then then something that just doesn't do the job. Because the last thing I want to do which I've done a few times this season is have to grab a rifle, start chasing after it, get myself in a position and try and take a long shot well, it's the dirty side to deer stalking, isn't it?

Speaker 2 1:49:44

which yeah, oh, like, turn a blind eye to, or um say, never happens. Well, well, it does. It does happen. And it happens to novices a lot more than than they would probably admit. But it also happens to the professionals a lot, because they come complacent. I come complacent, yeah, yeah, I shoot a lot of. I've got my own range. I'm very privileged to have my own range out to 800 meters. I've got steel targets, all supplied by the steel target company um hugh there. He's given me some fantastic deals and I'm shooting muntjac at like 700 meters.

Speaker 2 1:50:25

But I tell you what? You don't get much reaction off of that steel plate. You're all yours little dings and you're like they're in a lot in that. There's not a lot of velocity in that deer at that rate. And I and it comes back to um knowing your limits, knowing your kit, understanding your kit, understanding the parameters of the wind, understanding your surroundings, I mean we were in on deer this evening. We could see him in the thermal, couldn't see him in our binos, couldn't see him at all. They were in thick cover and I said to ryan I was like they're here somewhere, I was like they're down there. We just cannot get on them, um, but you just got to learn to back out and go. That's not a safe shot, it's not good, I'm not going to get away with it. And learning that, and you learn that 99 times out of 100, the hard way um, yeah, yeah, yeah, well, we, we learned.

Speaker 3 1:51:17

So we were out in that red storm. What was that? Two weeks ago up here and I have never seen wind drift on a three. I've I've had wind drift in ireland that the range there and we had probably the best part of three or four inches of wind drift. I have never seen 150 grain bullet on a 308 at 230 yards do 18 inches, yeah, yeah, and it's just like that just shows you the power of the wind coming through that corrie. And the boy shot and I said to him just go looking at your, your road target behind you. He went middle of body because we thought we had wind drift. He neck shot, that deer, yeah and it was just like that's just mental.

Speaker 3 1:51:57

It dropped on the spot, luckily, but yeah it was just one of those things. It's just like that is. That just goes to show the power of the wind, and and if you take it for granted that you think you can shoot when you're in these extreme conditions, it changes it completely now imagine you don't understand what's happened.

Speaker 2 1:52:14

Yeah, I've taught quite a few people and I'm not saying I'm a long-range instructor or anything like that, but I have taught. I understand ballistics, I understand trajectory, I understand a ballistic app, I understand how ballistics work and I have taught more than 10 people how to take their rifle and I've gone okay. So you have shot deer at 100 meters in 15 seconds. That deer is now at 310 meters. There is a target at 310 meters. Engage it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they've emptied magazines and hit dirt and I'm like that's a wounded animal. It is your responsibility as a stalker to knowingly shoot that deer correctly. If it goes wrong which it does it is your responsibility to then have the knowledge to go and shoot that deer as long as it's safe in the parameters of what your kit will allow you. And if you can't take a 300 meter shot correctly because you don't know your kit, then that's irresponsible in my, it's very irresponsible.

Speaker 2 1:53:25

If you go, well, actually all I do is stalk woodland. I'm never going to be able to shoot 300 meters. That's fine, I get it, but there aren't many fields that you can't go. Do you know what that deer? I shot it in the, in the on the tip of the valley. It's ran down into the woodland and it's gone up onto the other field.

Speaker 2 1:53:42

All of a sudden, your trajectory, your windage, your ballistics have changed. You are now no longer in your comfortable zone. You have a injured animal that is now running. It is your responsibility to know what you can do. Um, and I've had people come to me and go. I need to do that.

Speaker 2 1:54:00

I I preach this quite, quite heavily and they've come. I need to be able to do this and with a little bit of tuition and I'm not trying to sell people come and have a day with me, because I really don't want you to come and have a day with me. I am not promoting't want you to come and have a day with me. I am not promoting that. I will stress that I am way too busy. But go and set a target up at 100 metres, go and set one up at 250 metres and go, bang, reload, wait 10 seconds, set your sticks again, bang Shoot the other one and get comfortable with it. Bang, shoot the other one and get comfortable with it and get used to that, especially where you live. I mean, most of your average shots, I would say, are 300 meters or something I, I, I heal.

Speaker 3 1:54:40

Well, the thing about it is where we've been stalking is you can push it. You can push long shots if you want, but the other thing you've got with us is everything is most of the time, it's a very big downhill angle. So you're looking over 45 degrees and it's explaining that to the client and how they are. Oh, it's 300 meters away. Well, actually, at 45 degrees, at that range it's only about 210.

Speaker 3 1:55:05

But I want you to aim. I need you to aim high. I need you to pin it right through the top of the shoulder up near the spine, but that's not where the heart is. Trust me in a 3d model. That's exactly where the heart is. I want you just to pin it right through the top of the shoulder up near the spine, but that's not where the heart is. Trust me in a 3d model. That's exactly where the heart is. I want you just to pin it there and and and it's getting all of that.

Speaker 3 1:55:19

To explain it actually to them on the hill as well as that, their heart's racing, they're pumping, they're thinking about it, they've realized that they're hanging over the edge of a cliff at the same time and it's like just pull that shot off. And when they do, it works perfectly. But then they overthink it and they go oh, back to their dsc1. I've got to wait for the center of the body, for the heart shot. You shoot low, you blow through it, you drop through the top of its leg, you blow its elbow out on the other side and it's like, right, that deer, you might have clipped the lung. Let's hope it goes down, I mean this is a little bit.

Speaker 2 1:55:51

I would much prefer hit a deer high than I would low, and that's what I've said to everybody.

Speaker 3 1:55:56

Now, when we're out, there is like literally rest my crosshairs on the back of its spine. If you do that, you've got so much to drop. Yeah, that bullet's going to hit something of vital, vital, yeah I have tracked so many uh brket shot deer.

Speaker 2 1:56:13

It is unreal and I don't find many. No, no, no, because those deer run on.

Speaker 3 1:56:19

Yeah, and they can go a long and people don't realise they can go a long, long, long way.

Speaker 2 1:56:24

Yeah, well, I mean talking of tracking. About a year or so ago I had a good friend of mine. He was out with a client and they shot. I thought they shot a fallow um, because I know red, red prickets and fallow spikers, so that's the terminology I use yeah, yeah and he turned around and he said I've shot a spiker.

Closing Thoughts and Chinese Water Deer

Speaker 2 1:56:49

So I was like, okay, that's fine. So he shot a fallow. Um, I got there and I was like god, it stinks of reds here. He said, well, yeah, I shot a red and I thought you shot a fallow. I said, oh god, we got a lot on here. I said, have you got shot of red? And he's like yeah, I was like, well, it's gut shot here. Mate, you've got a shot of red. Yeah, yeah, my, my young dog, she tracked that nearly three kilometers um, through real thick, um woodland, um forest, almost forestry, and woodland um. And when we got it, typically like what gutshot animals do they go to water? So it went down and it was. I don't know if they go down there to drink, if it's like thirst that they crave or if it's some sort of I don't know. I don't really know, but they go to water when they're gut shot. If you ever gut shot a deer and you lose it, go and find your water source yeah yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 1:57:48

A lot of the time it'll be down by water. Um, looking out the window now I could be absolutely anywhere, um. But we tracked this deer like three odd kilometers and it was still moving, it was still mobile. We were on the tail of it and it was still walking and that was shot with a 308 uh copper bullet in the liver and it we always know a liver shot is quite a fatal shot well, it takes time, but it is a fatal shot yeah absolutely it takes time and that animal was strong enough to keep moving and once it was moving, it kept moving.

Speaker 2 1:58:22

Um, and the the the guide, managed to shoot it freehand in the end, put one in its chest. My dog was baying it and barking at it and, um, he managed to. He said call your dog off. I went, just shoot it. The dog's like well away, the dog won't go in on it. Um, and he managed to shoot it correctly, safely, um, and he was astonished about how hardy an animal can go when it's shot incorrectly. And I said it, did it not give you another shot? And he said no, the lad wasn't quick enough, he just caught, got caught up in the moment. By the time I got the rifle, um, this, this animal just disappeared and I was like he said there was also other deer there as well. So there was quite a bit of confusion of which deer was struck correctly and I was like, well, you've done the right thing and we managed to recover that. Um, and that animal went into the food chain.

Speaker 3 1:59:20

You know, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was, it was fine, it was okay obviously, to be honest, we've seen, we've seen reds that we've had it this season. They're so packed full of grass that we've had guys shoot them in the liver and it's literally hit that top load of this top lobe of the stomach, but it's so packed with with vegetation the bullet just is absorbed. It's like a sandbag and that's it. There's no bullet coming out and and there's no exit wound or anything and and in some cases we've had a liver shot where it's gone down. In some cases we've had to put a second shot in it to drop it. But you, you get over there, grolic it out and, as I say, it's so packed, nothing's leaked, it's just a solid lump of green. You take it all out. It's clean, it's good to go.

Speaker 2 2:00:00

Yeah, there you go, yeah, and that again, that's the dirty side to deerstalking, isn't it? It is, it's the realistic side to to what really really goes on, you know, but hey-ho. So what else have I got? I've got to say some thank yous because at one point in my knife-making life I couldn't give a knife away. Like most knife makers most probably, they had to surround themselves with people that would put a little bit of trust and use their kit. And I need to say thank you to these people because they, without their help, I genuinely would not be, and I'm going to say, successful I wouldn't be. First one is my good friend, ryan Brentnell. I gave him the Brent knife, which I named, so I named a lot of them after them. I gave him the Brent knife, which I named, so I named a lot of them after them, right? So he's Ryan Brentnell, he's the, he owns the Brent knife and that's the unzipper.

Speaker 2 2:01:04

So, unzips the stomach and where you would then go in on the bleed hole, where you go in the clavicle, yeah, and then you would go up to the esophagus. That is a perfect knife for any novice stalker using and starting out. Yes, you can go and buy an ecker swing blade because it will do both sides. I have no problem. I learned on one of those knives brilliant bit of kit. However, I could never get the bloody thing sharp, which is, in turn, why I ended up buying knives from other people that I ended up going well, I'm just going to use this knife to open this bit. So Ryan, uh, really good friend of mine, he's probably the closest part of my inner circle. Um been out stalking with him this evening, um, but he pioneered that. He told people that this was the best knife when it wasn't uh that he that he'd ever used. Um, he had massive hands so we had to kind of tailor it and then we had to nurture it and then we built around it. He said, well, what about this grip x, y and z? So so he really pioneered my um brent knife, which is the unzipper um one.

Speaker 2 2:02:08

The next lad is tom davis at Dartmoor Deer Services. Fantastic lad, really quiet lad, lives in a real beautiful hamlet on Dartmoor. He helped me in my Instagram. He got hold of me yeah, let me help you with your Instagram. I gave him a knife.

Speaker 2 2:02:30

He I went out deer stalking with him and I said, let's, let's, let's do some promotional stuff and whatnot. And I was like you are really bad with a knife, you are like really clumsy. Um, and he was like, yeah, I am so clumsy I've got cuts all over my hands. I always cut myself. I'm always getting it wrong. Um, and what I did is, if you ever see one of my knives, it's got a like finger protection on it and it comes down to straight edge, lovely pointed, angled curvature to the blade. But it's got this finger swell and then a lovely piece out the back which you would then grip onto and indexes correctly because it's it sits naturally in your finger.

Speaker 2 2:03:15

From that point on, he never cut himself again because he was like I know where the tip is, I know where the sharp edge is. It's nowhere near this bit. So for any idiot that likes cutting themselves, that's a type of knife you need, because it stopped him exactly doing that. Um, and that's tom davis, um. The third one is definitely mark stops stopsy down in essex. He's a proper essex wide boy um. I hadn't really been stalking with him, but uh, he ain't a very big lad and I would love to see him drag red deer um, because I think he he would be quite comical to watch. However, what he has done for me is so I surrounded myself with people that did deer stalking.

Speaker 3 2:04:02

And I went.

Speaker 2 2:04:03

I need you to help me do this. But, mark, every client he takes out he demonstrates my knives, he promotes them, he sells, sells them. He he has sold me, without a doubt, the most knives. Um, so I'm in indefinitely indebted to him. When he phones me and says I need a new knife, I go yeah, bubba, I'll stop what I'm doing and get you a knife sorted out.

Speaker 2 2:04:29

The other lad is uhron Thornhill, not a recreational stalker, by realistic, doesn't shoot a lot of deer. Real country boy, lovely family man. My boiler and my water tank went bad. Click of a finger. He was in his truck. He's a plumber by trade. Click of a finger. Down from Liverpool Down to Cornwall, fixed it for me. We went, went out stalking. I think we shot a couple of robux. Um, you know, really, really helped me. But what he does is he promotes me in such a good way is anything I do. It's. There's always a thumbs up and it's so good. Some days when you're in the workshop you've had a shit day and like I break knives, I break them and I'm like I've lost a whole day here. But he'll give me a thumbs up and I'm like cheers, mate, that that's. That's really really class um aiden brown. I don't know if you know him.

Speaker 2 2:05:24

He's a rogue, I do, yeah, yeah he is, without a doubt, funny and he's quite new to me really. Um, he's an ex-army lad so I've got like loads of banter with him. Um, and he is. He's a different type of breed of deerstalker because I would say that he's quite into all of his um, new technology and he's into the latest kit and whatnot, which is great because it publicizes it and he's not afraid to show you it and tell people about it. And again he's, he's using he's actually using one of my ex knives. He brought one of my knives that I used off of me, um, so he's using that and I'm like, keep using it, mate. And he and he again tried and tested kit that he's using. Um, uh, last but not least, is is is alan barrel.

Speaker 2 2:06:15

Um, he came to me when I needed him the most. Um, I got myself in a little predicament that the police took my rifles away. A, b and c. Uh, I got them back very quickly and he was my rock um, he helped me when I needed him the most. Um, I've been over to ireland stalking with him. 70 year old man, still dragon seeker like he's. A uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, and I, I admire him. Um, he, you know, I when I'm 70. I hope I'm like him. I really do. I really hope I'm like him. If you spent one hour with him, you would become either extremely bored or you would become infatuated with deer because of how he speaks about it it's not this different way.

Speaker 2 2:07:08

He talks about deer in a different manner and if you're not on that level then you would find it kind of boring. But people like that are really into deer stalking and passionate about deer stalking. You spend any little bit of company with him and you can't help but just get engrossed in him. We sat one night. Our power went out, the little power we had while we were living off grid. I went out, the little power we had while we were living off grid.

Speaker 2 2:07:35

We sat there in our underpants with our kit drying over the little uh log burner in the dark, drinking slow gin, and he was just talking to me about pierre david's deer and I was I've never even seen one and he was like, oh, they're beautiful animals. And we and he talked to me about these deer for 45 minutes. I had no idea the extensive knowledge that this man that he's got of those days, oh, and then he would go, oh, in the 70s we were doing this and I was like, oh, my god, I wasn't even born. I was not even born in the 70s and it's just so refreshing that people like him are still like that at that age.

Speaker 2 2:08:13

Some people are in care homes yeah, yeah, and he's still out doing it exactly and he, he said to me, he said this island trip I have never hunted so hard, he said, and it's done nothing but driven me to do more he says, because it's going to come a time that I'm not going to be able to do it.

Speaker 2 2:08:29

He said I I you know he's very open about that. He's like I'm a 70 year old man, it won't be long'm, not going to be able to do it. He said I, you know he's very open about that. He's like I'm a 70 year old man, it won't be long and I won't be able to extract deer off there, off of anything. Um, and people like that, if you've got a friend like that or you know someone like that, go and make sure that you help them. Still stalk, still go out, take. If if once upon a time they were on your permission and you've now got it, go and take him out. Because, believe you me, the stories that you will hear you'll either really dislike or you will fall in love with.

Speaker 3 2:09:06

And I and I, yeah absolutely, I can completely agree with you on that. We, we, we sadly lost our old boy up here. He was in his, he was 84, but literally the week before we lost him he was still out on the pheasant field putting pheasant nets on and out stalking and there was nothing you could stop him with, and I think the only problem was it was a trip to hospital. That's what finished him, otherwise he'd still be here today doing it fantastic, fantastic.

Speaker 2 2:09:31

That is fantastic. So I suppose that leads me on to what is the future yeah go on.

Speaker 2 2:09:37

What is the future of me? Um, so stalking show is already paid for, so I will be at the stalking show this year. Um, I'm a big advocate for the ngo. Um one, because they came to me when I needed them the most. Um two, I think they deer stalkers are being left alone, aren't they? In the grand scheme of things, I think so, yeah, yeah, I do too. Um, I think at the moment the game keepers are having a bit of a hard time with the amount of pheasants that they're rearing, the avian bird flu, covid shutting down shoots, a b and c living crisis, all that kind of stuff. But I think at the moment there's a little bit of a shift that the game keepers are now starting to take a bit of the heat of what maybe, like the fox hound type, people have taken for many years. Um, and I think they need our help the most. I think that, even if you're not a gamekeeper, even if you're just a deerstalker, if you're a fisherman, if these boys at the moment are taking the brunt for all of us, um, and I think they're under massive scrutiny because if they do anything wrong, their game, theiracs or their shotguns are taken away straight away. So they need, in my eyes, protecting the most at the moment, I believe. So I'm a massive NGO fan, so please go and like, support the NGO. It's a 45 quid membership, you know. That's absolutely not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things. Um, and support them, um.

Speaker 2 2:11:17

So I will be at the stalking show this year, um, and I'm going to build a knife for the ngo. Um, that will have pewter badges of salmon and, uh, a roebuck, a woodcock and a pheasant or something like that. That's a that just came to me, yeah, yeah, and and it will be auctioned off. I'm gonna ask them to make sure that they get like 100 tickets or something over there and we put it a tenner a ticket or something like that, and all money is to go into the ngo. I don't want it. I don't want them. I want them to have a little bit of uh comebacks on that.

Speaker 2 2:11:56

Um, so I will be at the stalking show. I'm going to take a huge amount of knives this year. I'm going to prep better. Um, I'm going to definitely have a lot more skinning knives. I cannot believe how many skinning knives I should have sold. I should have sold 100 skinning knives. I couldn't believe I took three. I couldn't believe it. I took one naked knife. That's it. Yeah, I'm going to take a hundred. Um. I'm going to give discounts to anybody that goes there. I'm going to drop my prices to make sure that people get what they want.

Speaker 2 2:12:33

Um at the day to support the, the stalking community. I really and I do really mean that um inside richie nank's knives. I'm going to and I say this really loosely because I'm really scared of what it might do I'm going to start opening up where you can come and build your own knife with me. Okay, um, I don't want it to turn into five days of hell. No, it doesn't need to be. Um, it'll be fairly basic to start with. Um, it'll be stained steel only because we can do that quicker than Damascus. But you will cut. You can come to me. I'm not going to charge a lot of money. I'm not going to like rip blokes off or anything like that, but I am going to give them the opportunity to go away, build their own knife with me. They'll have my parameters set to it, so it will go out like as if it was one of my knives yeah, yeah but they would have built it and it'll have a different tag on it.

Speaker 2 2:13:33

Um, and it'll be their own type of tag, with my emblem next to it oh magic, that's, that's good, yeah, yeah yeah, I just think, do you know? I've been asked a couple times and I've shied away from it but um, I do think that there's this primitive skill that men kind of need, and it's maybe swinging a hammer or working a grinder is exactly what it is yeah, no, absolutely I think that that's that's.

Speaker 3 2:14:00

That's that's quite a nice one to uh. Yeah, they kind of they've got your skill set there, they've built their own knife and actually they can go. I've done this, they go home, and it does make it that little bit more personal as well, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 2:14:13

I'm just a bit afraid that I then build a hundred more knife makers.

Speaker 3 2:14:19

Possibly, but there's still always the art of. I don't think you will, because I think what you end up with is anybody could have watched Forged in Fire or anything like that, but they've got the reassurance that you're there. They've seen what goes through it. They're not going to probably want to make another one.

Speaker 2 2:14:37

No, yeah, most probably that that's what it'll be, but so the other thing is also, I've got my own clothing line started. Um, I found a company that make a really really good lightweight. I found a lightweight stalking jacket at the moment hat, hoodie, uh, a snood, sorry. Um, it's got my emblem on it, um, and I'm selling them at cost. Um, right, it's a text message is all I have to send. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't need to earn money out of a text message and earn 80 quid a jacket. I don't need to do that and I want to see people wearing my kit. The stalking jacket that I have found I have tested it is waterproof to a certain degree. It's not 100%. It's breathable in the summer, it's wind resistant, which is really really good, and have a guess what? It's fairly cheap uh and I was like do you know what?

Speaker 2 2:15:39

mine has got blood all the way up the sleeves, um, and, and it's not a great deal, it's. I got kuyu kit, which I wear, which I am afraid my life to wreck, um, you know. But but I am trying. I haven't found a winter jacket yet, but when I do, that will be the next thing.

Speaker 3 2:15:59

Fantastic.

Speaker 2 2:16:01

And I've got to. The last thing is I've got to shoot a Chinese water deal this year. It's the only thing I haven't shot.

Speaker 3 2:16:08

That's exactly the same as me. But yeah, there's, there's a possibility. I'm heading down to norfolk. Maybe at some point I've uh, I may have one lined up down there, but it's finding time to get down there so I'm going to go with a, a knife maker.

Speaker 2 2:16:22

No, sorry, a lad that brought a knife off me. Um, a funny story actually. He. I sent him his knife. He rung me and said richie, I haven't received this knife yet. Oh, okay, buddy, let me just go and check with um the, the postal service. And they went yeah, here's, we've got a picture. And it said it's by the recycling. So my knife that I sent him, that he paid for, went out for the recycling. Oh no, so he was like you're joking me. I take that slip and we'll claim on the insurance. He said I've lost it. I said well, I've got a photocopy of it here. I've taken a screenshot. Yeah, yeah, because there was a signature on it and because they said we have delivered it and you haven't been bothered about where it's been put in the past. There's not really an argument.

Speaker 2 2:17:14

So I said I'll make you another one for free. And he went will you come and shoot a chinese water deer with me? Perfect, and I went, that's a deal, mate. So chinese water deer for me this november, december, january, sometime, uh, and that's my uh, six species shot and, to be honest, I don't say this to upset any chinese water deer avids, but they don't really they're not. There's not a real big draw to them for me, not really no it's the teddy bear in the field.

Speaker 3 2:17:43

I think they're meant to be impressive to see, but I don't think it's. I think I think the stalk is not going to be something like you'll remember from the seeker or or running up the hill to chase a red or a roebuck at the, the sort of the, the iconic picture of a roebuck standing in a park, kind of thing do they rot like other deer I don't know.

Speaker 3 2:18:04

I honestly I don't really know their activity. I know they group around in big herds and when they go, that's it, they're like four postcodes away because normally the nature is they're being chased by a tiger or go, that's it, they're like four postcodes away because normally the nature is they're being chased by a tiger or something like that. So they're just gone.

Speaker 2 2:18:18

Oh, yeah, yeah. I for me, exactly I think I'm just going to go and shoot a male half decent male that I can put on my wall and say that's a chinese water deer and there you go.

Speaker 3 2:18:32

It takes the box, doesn't it? Yeah, the box and um, come back to sunny cornwall and, uh, go back out on the reds well, I think that I think actually, that's probably the best place for us to to bring this to a close. So thank you very much. It's been uh. It's been fantastic. We've had uh plenty going on, and it's been a been a good evening.

Speaker 2 2:18:55

Somebody just popped in the door yeah, um, I did tell you didn't I can talk I don't know, but that that's exactly what it's all about.

Speaker 3 2:19:04

So, um, yeah, we'll, we'll call it there.

Speaker 2 2:19:07

Thank you very much no, thank you, peter, thank you for having me and uh to all the boys listening. Make sure you uh subscribe to peter and look after him, because he's doing some good things for our industry. Don't ever forget that. And good for you, mate, for putting us on that platform.

Speaker 3 2:19:23

That's all right, we'll keep it going.

Speaker 2 2:19:26

No, thank you, mate, see you later, stay safe.

Speaker 3 2:19:41

I hope you enjoyed that podcast as much as I enjoyed recording it with Richie very interesting character and some some great things going on. If you haven't had a chance, go check out his knives. Go check him out on instagram that's richie nanks knives and see what he's up to. We've got some more guests lined up and more podcasts have been recorded. I'm also gonna carry on. I think we had some some questionnaires on instagram. I will get those recorded down as soon as I can and bring those to you as well. Anyway, enough rambling. Now we're up to two hours 20. We will let you crack on and hopefully listen to the next one.