One Hell Of A Life Outdoor Podcast
The One Hell Of A Life Outdoor Podcast hosted by father-son duo Tony Vogel and Tristan Vogel, Owners of Zero Duck:30 and Zero Buck:30 . Our passion lies in bringing every hunter the REALITY of what it REALLY takes to hunt their target animal while equipping them with the knowledge to be a successful hunter and promoting the lost "old school values" that laid the foundation for the sport we love so much today.
One Hell Of A Life Outdoor Podcast
From Sporting Clays Stand Out to Waterfowl & Upland Enthusiast: Dawson Peek's Outdoor Journey
Dawson Peak shares his journey from growing up on a family-owned sporting clay range and quail hunting preserve to becoming a college shooting champion and avid waterfowl hunter.
• Growing up in a family business managing sporting clay courses, rifle/pistol ranges, and quail hunting in Quitman, Georgia
• Managing 26 hunting dogs of various breeds and the challenges of keeping them healthy in Georgia heat
• Competing in sporting clays from age 12 and eventually winning national championships with Georgia Southern University
• Finding success in college shooting competitions and the financial challenges of the sport
• Using a Lab as both a waterfowl retriever and quail flush dog
• Tips for better wingshooting: keep both eyes open and focus on the target, not the barrel
• Hunting diver ducks along the Florida-Georgia coast and dealing with saltwater challenges
• Story of an epic public land teal hunt where 16 hunters joined forces and nearly everyone limited out
• The importance of being honest with game wardens and respecting wildlife conservation
To book a quail hunt or visit the sporting clay courses at Dawson's family business, contact him at 229-415-6028 or find him on Instagram @dtpeak2016.
what's going on, guys, tristan and tony back with the one hub, life outdoor podcast, and this is the first time we're back in the studio. Uh, if you've been plugged in with what we've been doing, we've been dropping all these episodes recorded at the ducks expo, which was an absolute blast, but today we have on dawson and uh, his last name's, peak, and I have him in my phone as dawson uh, a town that we've hunted in because that's where I met him when we were out on that teal hunt that we've talked about 100 times on the podcast.
Speaker 3:Oh, we're going to talk about it another 101 times.
Speaker 2:But Dawson just finished up his college shooting career and we actually ran into him at the Ducks Expo as well, over at the Migra booth, and we're excited to talk with him. He's a fellow Georgia guy and spent growing up out on, the uh, florida coast sounds like doing some diver hunting. But uh, dawson, thank you for joining us. Man, we're excited to talk with you yes, sir, thanks for having me absolutely, man.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, tell everybody just a little background. You know, growing up, I guess, kind of on the for florida georgia line there I guess you know, you'd say you know what what that was like and how'd you get into the outdoors and all that right.
Speaker 4:So growing our, I guess. First of all, as he mentioned, my name is dawson peak. I'm from valdosta, georgia, and uh spent my whole life um hunting. So my family, my dad, he uh went to school at abac and studied in the outdoors and then all of a sudden decided that I guess college wasn't his thing and started managing some properties for people and ended up opening up a sporting clay range and quail hunting preserve and so that's kind of what he's done his whole life.
Speaker 4:And then, as you know, I kind of fell into the groove of things as I got older and working for him um, working on the clay range we had rifle and pistol, pistol range, sporting clays and quail hunting and kind of started guiding hunts when I got old enough and kind of fell in from there. I guess shooting sporting clays competitively and hunting quail kind of fed me into trying to hunt things other than quail, hunting waterfowl and did a little bit of deer hunting there. But waterfowl holds a holds a special place in my heart but uh, I guess that's kind of how I got into it no, that's.
Speaker 2:That's kind of interesting. I mean, I knew that's what you did now with the quail stuff. I didn't know that was um kind of like a family business, I guess.
Speaker 4:Huh that's right. Yeah, we're based out of quitman, georgia. Um, not far out of out austin, we have two sporting clay courses, we have a rifle and pistol range and then we also do the do the hunting, um, and that that normally starts up for us around november and goes through, uh, february. We'll kind of lead into the first week of march by that point. It's getting too hot on our dogs and I ain't, uh, I'm not losing a dog over having fun. The quail hunt, uh, that's not georgia.
Speaker 2:He'll get to him real quick oh, I don't blame you, man, I would imagine, um, even those certain times a year, there's, there's times within that that you got to be like all right, we're not going out, you know, past 11 o'clock or whatever you know right.
Speaker 4:There's times which we have a lot of dogs. We have, I believe, 25 or 26 dogs right now. So whenever we set up in the morning, we kind of keep in mind the temperature of the day and what it's going to be like and make sure we have our water with us and then we can swap the dogs out as we go. You know, even if they're only on the ground for 20 minutes, you know that's still getting them on the ground and we just swap them out and keep on rolling.
Speaker 2:I got you yeah.
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Speaker 2:Enjoy flavors like Morning Wood, dark Dynasty, cinnamon, teal, snickerdoodle and First Flight to unlock the flavor that you'll enjoy in the blind for years to come I've only been on one quail hunt I think we may have talked about this a little bit at ducks, but it was just this uh, past um, past february, and I really I thought it was really fun, dude.
Speaker 2:I mean it's kind of sad, like when you go on one to like think about like georgia's heyday, because I mean you know way better and I do like back in the day, this is what like georgia's heyday, because I mean you know way better and I do like back in the day, this was what, like georgia was naturally just like the best quail hunting state, but, um, it gives you a taste of that.
Speaker 2:And then also, I, I don't feel like it's one of those things that feels too like um, like it doesn't feel like a like you're probably like a mallard, a staged mallard hunt. You know what I mean like, because I, the way I understand it's like you know it's a certain amount of birds and then your guide kind of goes and sets them out and, you know, does the thing with them, but you're jumping these birds up and, uh, you know, once they're flush, you're shooting at them and stuff, and I I just feel like it has a a genuine vibe, like feel to it I really enjoyed it didn't really didn't really feel like like I've never wanted, I've never done one of those like private lake, like grown you know pet mallard type duck hunts, but I feel like the quail. It doesn't feel like that, at least to me.
Speaker 4:Right, we try to make sure our birds are in good health. As far as you know, when we take you on a hunt Because we don't want to get out there with our hunters and we start flushing you know, I personally use my lab as a flush dog and I don't need him jumping in and catching the birds because the birds don't have enough get up in them um, we try to pay close attention to them, make sure that our hunters get a good, I guess, home feeling to a old-fashioned quail hunt. Um, I just it's not much fun when you sit there and just watch your dogs grab birds the whole hunt because they can't get up off the ground. But like so we try to keep it as natural as possible, make you feel like it's not a pre-released hunt and uh, you're, you know, hunting birds in their natural element right right now.
Speaker 2:Um, and you know, I thought it was really interesting too. I'd like to hear some more about like the dogs working together, because when I went they had a, you know, a flush dog was a lab, like you said and then they um, you'd have the, the pointers that would you know, put it kind of let them know where it was, but it's cool to watch the dogs work and attain them like that that's right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so we have several different types of dogs. We got our setters, we have red setters, english setters, we have some german short hair pointers, we got some britneys. Um, we got some english pointers, uh. And then I got my lab and, um, I have another lab that in in the works of getting trained and working with her, hopefully I can use her as a flush dog, which you take a dog on a hunt like that and it's, it's in there. It's natural for them to hunt, so they're automatically using their nose or automatically going to it.
Speaker 4:All of our bird dogs well, my lab, I have been trained for waterfowl and, uh, the only thing I've ever done with them was hunt waterfowl and and dove I was. You know what. I got him and I do more quail hunting because I have to guide as part of my job. You know I get to use him more doing that if I use him, so I started using him. About the third hunt he just sat down when we got up, when the dogs were on point. He just sat down with other dogs and I was like, what's he doing? I flush him up. He ran in there and flushed him up.
Speaker 4:We're on the way back to the truck that same day. I already kind of finished our drop for the day, our little route. He's kind of about 10, 15 feet up in front of me. He just stops and sits down. I wonder what's going on here. We get up to him I said come on, rip, let's go. He didn't move. I was like I'm just going to try something here. I'm going to kick this bush and see if something comes up. I went to kicking and thrashing around in there. Nothing, nothing would come out. I said, all right, flush it up, rip. He went in and smelling around, kept going to the same spot, but nothing would come up. Nothing would come up. I was like man you've done, sat down on a rat or something You've picked up on a smell and you just think you're doing the right thing. But there ain't nothing there. I keep trying to get him off of him and he won't leave. So I get down and pull the vines back and a bird had done bird up in a hole there.
Speaker 4:I was like man, I guess he does pick up on this point and things. It ain't a traditional point. You know, go up to it and one leg up, tail up, he sits down. But you know I count it for something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, for real. And you know, when you have 26 dogs, man I got to imagine you know that's just a freaking, that's a whole different thing. On, you know the management and feeding all of them and what kind of goes into behind the behind the scenes, I guess, into taking care of all those dogs and keeping them trained and all that right.
Speaker 4:So, like I said, it's natural to them we don't do a whole lot during the summer. Uh, for two reasons. One, the heat. I mean every week, the past four or five weeks has been triple digits, feels like, and it's just too hot to get them out and running. Two, what comes with the heat? We're worried about snakes. When you've got snakes crawling around it's hard. We've got a big run built for the dogs to get out and run. So when we let them out, when we're feeding them up, when we're washing kennels down, every day they get a good amount of running in. They've got long runs that their actual kennels are in, so they they have a chance to move around and not coked up in a tiny pet crate all day, every day right but it's it's tough during the summer and early fall to really do anything.
Speaker 4:Um, so, like this past year we started me and my dad would like to do a Last year. Me and my dad would like to do a furfowl hunting in December. Well, we've done that the last nine years in a row with this outfitter in Arkansas. We had a great time, it was a great outfit and we always killed birds, but we were kind of ready to see something new, try something different. My dad used to do a bunch of pheasant drives up in south dakota and north dakota and we decided to do a little bit of freelancing.
Speaker 4:Um, I bought a dog trailer last year and we loaded up eight dogs me, him and a couple other buddies and we drove to montana and, uh, put the dogs down and hunted block management land and just got them to run.
Speaker 4:It was a little bit cooler up there so they could get their exercise in, kind of get them back in the groove of things for about a week, which ain't a long time, but it was just enough to kind of break a few of our dogs, get them loose, getting ready for season to come in, and had a blast while doing it. And then as days like when you're getting closer to season, as the days get a little bit cooler in the mornings, we try to get them out. We'll run them down the dirt roads or we won't quite run them in the woods yet. Just you know, fearing snakes, you don't want to get a snake, uh, snake bite, but uh, we'll run them up and down the road and just try to get their legs loose and and starting to get a little bit better in shape for the oncoming season man going out there and going out west.
Speaker 2:I feel like that'd be kind of like a bucket list thing to go out there and freelance.
Speaker 4:I like that man, it was a blast the first day. We didn't have much luck, um, kind of we're just between youtube videos and hearsay, and there was one gentleman that's going with us that he had been there before and done it before, so we were kind of just following his steps and didn't have much luck and and the places that we're walking I mean it's beautiful countryside you'd think there would be birds everywhere um flushing up and what we mainly hunt was grouse okay and I mean it's I guess the first place we went to.
Speaker 4:It was, honestly, I was kind of scared about which corner we were going to walk around.
Speaker 3:That big grizzly bear is going to be standing there waiting on us.
Speaker 4:I'm pretty certain that that 28-gauge birdshot was not going to help me in that situation. But with the second day come along, and from there on, man, we figured it out. We found some areas with a bunch of juniper bushes and just kind of figured out a common thing that the birds were always up under those juniper bushes. Do you figure it out or the dogs figure it, that the birds were always up under those juniper bushes?
Speaker 3:I mean we started picking them up. Do you figure it out or the dogs figure it out?
Speaker 4:A little bit of both. The only problem we had with our dogs was we were working with 30-mile-an-hour wind gusts. Oh, wow. And it was not helping those dog noses at all. And now, as far as the retrieving side of things, they had it down and by the third day they really picked up on the smell and going on point, figuring out how hunting grouse was different from hunting bobwhite quails in South Georgia.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I bet, man, I bet it's a whole different ballgame. You know, going back to you know you touched on it a little bit at the beginning but you know your time in college as a shooter and kind of how it went hand in hand with growing up, quail hunting and running the clays and all that stuff. Talk to us a little bit about you know how do you get into shooting for a college team and where'd you go and just some of the stuff you got to do.
Speaker 4:Right, so I'll start back kind of where I started. So, naturally, living on a gun range, you're going to shoot, you know, and I did all the things. I played soccer in grade school and played baseball and did all these things and it just never quite picked up for me. And I also shot archery and tried that out and I'm doing really well at it. But then I was kind of given ultimatum by the coaches that I need to pick. Am I going to shoot archery or am I going to shoot shotgun? Because they didn't.
Speaker 3:I guess they didn't like the time that I was putting forth for the archery and it's in the teens that morning and maybe you're chasing ducks or geese, but now it's September and it's 85 degrees and you're hunting early tealer geese. As a waterfowler, you need dependable weather protection that will not break the bank. Founded in 1996, FrogTogs is not only the leader in breathable wader technology, but a company you can depend on to keep you warm and dry head to toe, no matter your hunting environment.
Speaker 4:I just said well, I mean, it's a pretty easy decision. I live on a gun range.
Speaker 5:I mean, it was a pretty easy decision. I live on a gun range.
Speaker 4:I started shooting. And I probably started shooting when I was 10 and then started shooting competitively when I was about 12. And, man, I hit the road from there. I shot all the way up, shot every weekend. I was going to a different state shooting a different tournament, shooting for the nsca, which is a national national sporting clades association, and uh, had a lot of fun doing it and at the time, man it was, it wasn't many people my age doing it, it was more adult, so I was shooting against, you know, people over 30 you know, no one younger than that really did it at the time.
Speaker 4:Now you go around all these tournaments and there's a bunch of 13 14 year olds shooting 30 40 000 shotguns at these tournaments.
Speaker 4:So oh my god, this certainly changed since then, but I uh kind of hit the road, like I said, doing that me and my dad, my mom, my brother we traveled every weekend. Our summer vacation consisted of going to a tournament Normally it would be the US Open, one of the big tournaments that I would shoot in. We went to Kansas, we went to Texas a bunch, we went to Illinois, ohio. I've been to several different states shooting. Like I said, it just kind of rocked on.
Speaker 4:2016 came, um, I ended up getting sponsored, uh and done, uh, I mean, that was that was a, that was a, probably the highlight of my career at the time, at 16 years old, getting sponsored with a with a very high dollar shotgun, um, a Cree golf and man, it was uh, it was awesome and um sparked a little bit more in me, started shooting a little bit more.
Speaker 4:Rocked on through 2017, towards the end of that year I was in high school and it kind of catches up to you when every weekend you're going to a different state and during the week you're practicing or you know helping dad at the gun range to help pay for all these events and you know the loading machines or picking up holes and kind of got to the point that I didn't spend a lot of time with my friends that I had at school and none of them shot and they just weren't as interested in it as I was or just didn't have the background that I did, kind of wanted to start hanging out with my friends more, doing more with them on the weekends, going hunting, and my shooting career kind of slowed down, graduated high school in 2019 and went to college at ABAC Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College and they had a team before and it had gone dormant and I started back up, got a bunch of buddies together and we started shooting again.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's awesome dude.
Speaker 4:Yeah, went to a bunch of shoots with the school, with ABAC, and did well. Shot some tournaments in Nashville, tennessee, shot some tournaments in Ohio at the Carleton Shooting Center there and had a great time doing it. And three years into that I kind of reached the limit as far as what ABAC could provide me education-wise. I'm pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering and the coach at Georgia Southern had kind of talked to me before at some tournaments I had won with ABAC some state shoots that I won with them in the SCTP, which is like a scholastic program for kids as young as I want to say. I've seen 10-year-old shooting. They are young, young shooters all the way up through college I think the limit is 25 years old for that group but shot with them a bunch, won a bunch of tournaments and then decided that I was ready to go to Georgia Southern to finish out my engineering degree and walked on to the team here and man, we had a great team.
Speaker 4:Still do have a great team. We've won. I've been there for three years and we've won first in the nation two of those years and then one year we got runner-up in the nation but the runner-up was in Vegas one year and then the year we got runner-up in the nation and um, but the runner-up was in vegas one year and then the uh the two national championships that we won were in san antonio, texas, at the national shooting complex.
Speaker 4:And that's over sporting, play, ski and trap.
Speaker 4:So first in the nation over all three divisions wow um, for for our division two that we're in and man, we, we really dominated while we were there the year before I got there. They, that was the year they started, I believe, and they got first in the nation that year as well. Georgia southern southern been knocking it out the park as far as that goes. But last year was my, my last year I have one more semester of school left and decided to take a step back and, uh, I wouldn't really be able to attend most of the tournaments just because I will have already graduated in December. And so they're kind of on their own now and they got a great team this year and I foresee they will win nationals this year again and they're actually going to be competing in Division I this year.
Speaker 4:So it's going to be competing against a couple of higher teams that have a lot more shooters on their team, but I believe our 25 shooters will be able to take them on pretty easily.
Speaker 2:That's awesome, dude. When it comes to I mean, obviously to do all these events and stuff, I'm sure it's not cheap hotel rooms and travel, what is from a school standpoint? Is it like an on-scholarship type thing, or does everybody do some fundraising? How does that all work?
Speaker 4:We do a lot of fundraising, but just kind of backing up.
Speaker 4:When I was on my own, that was on my parents. I love them. They put me through a lot, helping me get to all these tournaments and shooting all these states, and really helped me out financially obviously, because as a you know, 15, 16, 17 year old, I'm not making the money to be able to attend all these tournaments, pay for practice targets, pray for ammo. When I got an A back, we did some. We tried to do some scholarships or not scholarships, but some fundraising to try to raise some money for us to be able to afford it a little bit better. Georgia Southern has it better, though. They're way better at their fundraising.
Speaker 4:Our coach, marty Fisher man, he works his butt off trying to fundraise for us and to get money for the team, because we have a club and we have the team.
Speaker 4:If you, you know, some of us walk onto the team and then other times we have tryouts to bring some talent in that we might not know about, that may not have been as good in a turnaround, we may not have noticed them, and they come in, try out, prove themselves, and we put them on the team. But if you're on the team, everything is paid for as far as your practice targets, your ammo, your competitions, your travel fees, your hotel fees Everything's paid for except for your food and your driving to practice. So that was one really great thing about Georgia Southern that helped me out on the team there as far as going to a bunch of those tournaments, because I mean still, as a college student man, it's, it's expensive for the sport. I mean you think about, we go to practice twice a week and we're shooting 100, 150 rounds and then you still got to pay for your targets when you go to those rounds.
Speaker 4:And and then, not to mention your airfare tickets to San Antonio or Las Vegas, nevada. I mean, it's expensive.
Speaker 2:Man, I can't even imagine yeah, I mean, I just know how I think about this. A lot with duck hunting, deer hunting and I mean any of it. It's all kind of expensive and it's kind of like it makes you wonder sometimes how these people can sustain certain things.
Speaker 3:Well, I'm sitting here thinking the whole time. You're saying that I'm thinking about what parents go through for travel ball. Yeah, baseball. Yeah, with baseball. I mean it's literally the same thing in so many ways, if not a lot more independence and helping pay for your stuff. I mean, everybody can kind of chip in on a team when there's parents, but when you got like one guy, one girl, one guy, whatever, you know what I mean it's like almost like family and and um, it's on you.
Speaker 4:You know a lot right, and what one thing that's cool about the uh, the nsca, um, going to those tournaments. You have a possibility to win good money, really good money, in tournaments, and it's difficult. I mean you're competing against pros that have been doing this for a long time and can spend a whole lot more time, a whole lot more money, practicing and shooting. And every tournament I went to it was if I placed or I won any money in the tournament, then that went this summer, make memories on florida's forgotten coast with williamson outfitters.
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Speaker 4:Back into our travel account. As far as my tournament, so you know every tournament I won. No, I didn't break even, obviously, because I mean there's no breaking even in this sport, because you just think about all the money you put in practicing and gas getting to the tournament, you know, or the side by side or whatever you buy to travel around in the tournament on the course and it's expensive.
Speaker 3:But you got to make a little bit of money winning something you can throw it in there. You got to provide your own side by side too, at the tournament.
Speaker 4:You. Oh yeah, you can rent a golf cart while you're there.
Speaker 3:But then big tournaments you go to, they're going, they're going to get their money's worth out of that golf cart, and then some man, I would think that that would well. Anyway, that's just my opinion. It doesn't matter is what it is. But no, I I mean your point is that, man, there's just a lot of responsibility that comes with that, and and maybe that's what makes y' all so good at shooting is just that you know you are having a young person's age, having to get like like physically and financially involved in your success. You know what I mean, and maybe it's a maturity thing, I don't know. I'm just sitting here thinking out loud.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's a. It'll really pull you out of your comfort zones a lot, but you meet a lot of people. It'll really pull you out of your comfort zones a lot, but you meet a lot of people.
Speaker 4:Okay, I've met several people that I can call now and, uh, you know they can give me advice, they can help me out. Um, there's a lot of great people in the shooting industry and man, I've like my coach, um, who really taught me everything I know, uh, ken Branham he, ken Branham he was. He lived in Jacksonville, he managed. We used to have a gun range down in Jacksonville. Florida called.
Speaker 4:WW Sporting Clays and uh, we had a gentleman there named Ken Branham. He ran the place for us and helped manage it for us and uh, he taught me pretty much everything. I know, you know my dad was there. He taught me a bunch of the basics, but Ken really really put a foot in there and and helped me out and taught me, like I, I said everything I know and he, uh, he's just, I mean the different people that you meet in the industry, it's just it amazes me. You know you got business owners, corporation guys, uh, and I mean they can offer you jobs in the future. Um, it really it plays a vital role. I mean mean it forces you to grow up mature. Because you start spending all this money at a tournament man, you don't want to shoot bad, you want to make it worth your while. You want to get your money's worth. You want to, you want to prove yourself. So you know you're not going to halfway do any of this. You got to be in it or you got to be out of it.
Speaker 2:There ain't no in between that's a good point, man, and we've talked about it before with um other folks. But like, uh, one thing just in particular is for sure like the from what I can tell, like the upland bird community is very um, like you said, a shotgun be 30, 40 000. I mean it's not like, I feel, like anybody that gets into it's pretty damn serious and it's probably a successful business person and or, like you said, somewhere from the industry or something like that. So I feel like, from a networking standpoint, just going on those quail hunts, probably a lot of guys that come to your guys's uh outfit, you know, or probably a lot of people networking doing business out there, you know yeah, we do a lot.
Speaker 4:most or I don't say but a good bit of our quail hunts are businesses doing entertainment with some of their customers or having I guess quote unquote business meetings and going on a quail hunt. That's a perfect business meeting in my mind going on a duck hunt or a quail hunt. Yeah, you meet a lot of these guys when guiding them and I met a lot of great people doing it and I can't tell you how many offshore fishing trips that I've scored that I can go on.
Speaker 4:People that I've met are like, hey, man, why don't you come down this summer and we go offshore fishing? Or you know, I have one customer, he's like he lives in the Bahamas and his vacation home is in boudast, and man, he's, he's a great guy, awesome, awesome gentleman. And uh, he comes in and he's like, yeah, anytime you'll come to the bahamas, you know, you and your family, you and your girlfriend, y'all come on down and uh, and hang out with us. I got a, I got a boat, y'all can take the boat out and just come hang out for a week or whatever.
Speaker 4:And um, and one thing he actually offers to us too is they have a lot of uh, dove hunting down there, or pigeon shooters, I think it's more, I think it's really pigeon shooting and uh, he sends me pictures all the time and, man, they're wearing out on the pigeons during pigeon season and uh, you know, just, it's trips like that that I get. I mean, yeah, getting a tip at the end of the hunt, that's great, and all that helps me get through college and take my girl out to dinner or buy groceries for the week or buy gas, that's great and all but the people that I meet and interactions that I get with these different guys. It's awesome.
Speaker 2:Dude, I got to say that's the first time I've ever heard that somebody had a vacation house in Valdosta Georgia and they live in the Bahamas.
Speaker 4:Well, you know what?
Speaker 2:Usually it's the other way around.
Speaker 4:He told me this I was shocked. I was shocked. I was like wait, I don't think I heard you, right man, Did you say your vacation home?
Speaker 3:Dude, no, no, like literally, when you go on like a upland bird hunt, I feel like you could show up to some camp and you'd be like, oh yeah, dude, I shot quail with uh joe rogan, donald trump, uh the pope and uh shibuzi today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's just, it's like, yeah, and they all brought their uh hundred thousand dollar shotguns and we, uh, we shot some birds and uh, it was fun, you know. But no, it seems like it's like when you think of the, the sport of hunting, right, and the stereotypes in the different continents, I mean, the first thing you think of in england or over there is, you think about fox hunting, right, right, it's got one of the deepest traditions and it's something that you know, the the um royalty did you know, and it was a very special, high-end thing even back then. And and here you know, not that duck hunting isn't or deer hunting isn't or any kind of big game or whatever hunting isn't, but it just seems like there's a bit of a stereotype, which is fine, with, like upland bird hunting, which is cool, I mean. I guess you know what I'm talking about yeah, yeah, I, I get what you're saying.
Speaker 4:Yeah, they uh, a lot of people, I guess, see it as one thing, and I don't know. It's upland, I want to say upland. Bird hunting has changed a lot over the years. I mean it's had to. Because you think about it, as you mentioned it earlier, you know back in the day you could walk down fence rows in a cow pasture and shoot wild quail every day during during the quail season, birds everywhere. I mean my dad tells me stories all the time and and then nowadays, you know we have 1300 acres there on our property and I can think of two wild coveys and they're really not that big yeah, it's well predators are just outrageous, and I mean you think about the thousands of birds we release on the property every year and still there's only two really wild coveys there that not survive wow, wow.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it is a special treat and, honestly, you know, same thing in illinois, um, and I'm sure in several other states that I haven't been to, but you know it's. It's one of those things where it's a rarity. When you're walking through the woods now and you're, you know, I mean you're like dude, that was quail the best one.
Speaker 4:The best is when you're walking to your deer stand and your feet come out from underneath. You're probably a quail.
Speaker 3:You just stepped on yeah, or a woodcock man. Geez, those things about freaking taking my heart away so many times.
Speaker 2:Turkey's getting off the roost.
Speaker 3:Turkey's getting off the roost. That's another one for sure. Those woodcocks, dude. You almost step on them every time, dude, and they got that long-ass needle-looking.
Speaker 2:IV thing, Snipe kind of.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, they freak me out. Actually, yeah, just they freak me out.
Speaker 4:I actually I have been on a real snipe hunt, not not the walmart bag in the middle of the night, but I've been on a real snipe hunt. If you have not done that before, you've got to do it I've seen a ton of them.
Speaker 2:Man, we were out there one time by uh, jekyll island duck hunting and oh gosh, I mean we had like swarm.
Speaker 3:I mean it was like dozens to hundreds, like dive, bombing us like as soon as that tide went down, dude, they started from the innermost part and just kept working it all the way to the water's edge and swinging that stuff, and we were just sitting there going, oh, baby, oh man they are they're very fun to shoot um very hard to shoot.
Speaker 4:It's a difficult bird hard.
Speaker 3:They're delicious too a hundred percent.
Speaker 4:They're really good.
Speaker 2:Ain't much meat there, but they're really good I've been really, uh, pleasantly surprised with how good quail is dude yeah, no, that was good, dove's good too oh yeah, I'll tell you this when it comes to to a quail.
Speaker 4:I spend so much time with them during the quail season that by the end of it, everything smells like a quail. I cook a steak it smells like a quail. I brush my teeth it smells like a quail, I change clothes and take a shower, it still smells like a quail and you get so sick of quail that you don't want nothing to do with it. Someone says quail and you just want to gag.
Speaker 3:That reminds me of working at McDonald's when I was, when I was 16. I was like, no matter where I went, I felt like I had mcdonald's on me everywhere. Oh dude, oh my god, that's funny everything smells like a 12 that's crazy, dude, you know.
Speaker 2:Getting back to kind of the hunting and the shooting, you know I kind of want to talk about from a technical standpoint, you know, like my dad's used the analogy before with other stuff, like you know, and sometimes when you go off you just want kind of want to just hit the ball or you know, it's not like you're out there trying to be tiger woods or whatever. You know, and I think with shooting, um, people probably do a lot of over complicated or complicating certain things You're talking about with a shotgun yeah, the shotgun.
Speaker 2:From your perspective, dawson people that are just wanting to be your average good hunter. What are some things you could share from a tip standpoint that you can go do to be better? Some of those skills have crossed over I guess right yeah, yeah, because some of it I know is kind of like you know, doesn't translate great to a hunt okay, yeah, so, um, I give lessons on the side.
Speaker 4:Um, actually I've done this, you know, a long time and probably my my favorite client is a is a kid or a young you know young guy that just getting into it and doesn't know much about it, and their parents are trying to get them better at it, and I really like working with those type of people but he's trying to tell me what's that I said.
Speaker 4:You're trying to tell me not to call you I will work with anybody of any age, but, but I can tell you this, it's normally the older people and I ain't saying just old, but older than, I'll say, 17 and up they don't listen. Okay, yeah, they come in, they want this lesson. I'm telling them to do these things, and then they just don't do it.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:I mean, like man, I want you to shoot 10 foot in front of that target and he still shoots one foot behind the target like you're not changing anything. Man, I you know, I know you're not going to hit it when you shoot 10 foot in front of it, but I need you to do something different for me, right?
Speaker 3:and that interesting point. I want to bring this point out right now that you know you are highlighting the fact that how coachable these people are young people are, and I think that what's cool about that is man, take that as a sign tonight, if you're listening to this is that even in my age you've got to take a step back sometimes and just go, man. I need to approach this situation just like with an open mind, like happy, not mad at the world, pissed off at work, whatever it was that day. You know and and I think you hit the nail on the head there is just that they're sponge at that age. You know just from being a dad and raising two kids and um, I just wanted to highlight that. I think that's an important point you make oh, man, it's.
Speaker 4:It's crucial because I mean a lot of, I guess guess I should just say older people. They grew up this one way their dad taught them this, or their uncle or someone they knew, relative or family friend or whatever. They taught them how to shoot. They taught them how to do this and then it's just built into them. It's a habit, it's something that they've created and they can't change. They physically almost cannot change themselves. To change it to do better, yeah, and it may work on on some cases when shooting, but it's not what. What I try to teach is going to work across the board. Now don't get me wrong. I can hit an orange target just about all day long, but you put a duck in front of me or dove. It's going to change a little bit yeah if you go and paint that duck orange.
Speaker 4:I'm probably going to hit it. But, if it ain't orange, it's a little bit more difficult Because there's a lot where the clay target is controlled. I know what that clay target is going to do when it comes out. I can set up for it. You can't set up for a duck or a dove. You can't set up for that. But the biggest probably tip that I can give that a lot of people that I see when I'm coaching is keeping both eyes open. All right.
Speaker 4:Y'all keep both eyes open. When y'all shoot, do y'all close one eye.
Speaker 3:I keep them both open. Yeah, both open.
Speaker 4:Yeah, okay. So tell me this and tell me if we're wrong. When you're duck hunting or dove hunting, you go up to shoot a bird, you got one eye closed. You got a very narrow sight plane or like not a big area to look at. You keep both open. You got your peripheral vision. You can see a bird left or right. Um, you can kind of gauge bird differently. And other thing too when you close one eye, you you focus in on what's closest, and what's closest is that barrel and that bead. You do not want to look at the barrel and bead, you want to look straight at whatever you're shooting and shoot. Because as long as you have your form down when I say form, you got your gun on your shoulder properly, you got your cheek on that stock properly, everything's lined up, the gun fits you.
Speaker 4:Wherever you're looking, that barrel is going to be plenty. It's hand-eye coordination. When you play baseball, you don't look at the bat when you swing at the ball. When you when you play basketball, you don't look at the basketball when you throw up for the hoop I mean you're looking at your target and everything else just goes with the motion.
Speaker 4:And that's the. That's probably the biggest tip I can put out. There is really focus on the object you're shooting at, versus that barrel or that bead. And if it were up to me, like my A400 that I shoot, I don't even have beads on it. They got knocked off and I never put them back on. Now, my competition gun, since it's a higher end gun, I can't just bring myself to go knock the beads off of it, but I don't use them. I'm looking directly at that target and I'm pulling the trigger. Don't think about it, don't try to measure, don't try to put that gap between the barrel and the bird, because the way I see it, you're not focused on that target or that bird, you're focused on your barrel or you're focused on a gap in between and you're probably going to miss.
Speaker 2:No, that's a good tip, man. I I think, um, one thing. I mean, I find myself at some points like and I've probably gotten better at this with time I just think one thing that I've struggled with with time has been birds going away from me or coming towards me. If, for some reason, like leading them left and right is easier for me almost than like going away or towards, you know, and it's just kind of interesting. Like, I don't know, does everybody struggle with different things? Or, you know, is that the kind of thing that a lot of people struggle with?
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, everybody has something they struggle with Some people that they're're their target, that they're really good as an incomer or going away. Uh, me personally I'm pretty much the same. I like a quarter and target or a crossing target, more so than an incomer or outgoing um. Trap has always been a little bit more difficult for me and you know that outgoing bird is kind of like a trap bird, except it's going over your head, um, or whatever, flying away, and it's just really being able to read what that bird's doing, kind of gauging the distance and and understanding, because, if you can kind of, it's not a science. I don't want to sound like a math problem or a science problem yeah it's.
Speaker 4:It's just kind of understanding the bird pulling the trigger. I mean it's just look at it, focus on it and really your brain's going to do the rest of it. That's what kind of practicing in the off season, going out shooting sport and clays. You know like coming to south when I shoot the sport and clays yeah, right yeah, yeah, come on out, come out and shoot with us.
Speaker 4:But you get to practice different types of shots and it'll prepare you for the season on what that dove is going to do, or what that uh duck's going to do, or quail, um, you know you shoot all these different types of birds. You get good at shooting those birds. Naturally, when you go to shoot at a duck that's flying in a similar pattern to what, um, you know the targets, you practice. You're just going to pick up and shoot it and you're probably going to hit it.
Speaker 4:It's really a lot of people overthink it, you know. Especially they got a duck coming in at them. They're not patient, they get excited and shoot way too early and then you know the bird could have flown a lot closer, could have landed right in front of you, but you wanted to shoot at it in the air and just got antsy. I mean, it happens to me. I get excited and can't wait no more and I call the shot, shoot them, let's go, and uh, you know, call it too early, but really, patience, it also works on your patience and uh, just being confident with your shots and and flowing with the motion yeah, no, that's, that's a good point, I think.
Speaker 2:Um, you know one thing that we've always we've talked in the past how, like deer hunting first kind of made us like better duck hunters in some, some aspects, and then in other aspects, probably made us worse, I don't know. But uh, you know, from a patient standpoint, you got to be so patient.
Speaker 2:My dad always was like you know, wait till your best shot wait for your best shot yeah, if you got a buck walking down a trail at 40 yards and you know you're gonna have there's no, the wind's not blowing that way there's no reason that it's gonna, you know, not be there at 20 yards, why not wait for it? But I think that's a good point to bring up. You know and it's not just you know if they're coming in, it could just be like, uh, you know, you know you're gonna get one more pass out of them and trying to get them to decoy in that last pass. You know, because if you're going to take the, the passing shooting shot at 40 yards, that's still going to be there, you know that's right yeah, yeah, no, it is.
Speaker 3:And I was sitting here thinking, you know, um, and I'll try to go through this as quick as I can, but you know, because I've been shooting a bow all my life, it's like an extension of my body. You know what I mean. Like, at this point, I'm certainly not as good as some of these guys that can, like, split an arrow coming at them and shoot an aspirin at 40 yards. You know all the shit. Instinctive, that's just special ability. They use the force somehow, there's no doubt about it. Tell me they don't. All right, that's a matrix shit. And they, they've unlocked the secret, like some stuff that that, um, I don't know, david blaine's got or I don't know. But anyway, the point is, is that you know my last big buck that I shot? Um, I made an instinctive shot with a, with a great bow, I'm shooting halon six and got every bell and whistle on it full metal jackets, all that stuff, right, and it's coming. I'm waiting. That's coming right down the hill. I just watched the doe go right underneath me and I'm up. When I'm on the creek, I'm probably about 22 feet in the air, but I'm sitting on a bank, if that makes sense on this on this crank side, but up here on the flat, it's only like 18 feet, you know, and she come running across there and I just got ready and set up because I said he's gonna come right across there and I'm gonna shoot him right here at at like 15 yards and I'm sitting there ready and I'm ready to pull back. Actually, I think I pulled back, yeah, I did. And as soon as he got to getting ready to get up to, to pull back, actually I think I pulled back, yeah, I did.
Speaker 3:And as soon as he got to getting ready to get up to that bank, and this is what I think happened my shadow and there'll be somebody that agrees with me on this shit, but I've had it happen more than once that I've had a buck walk up to my shadow and I don't know if this happened in this situation, but the sun, my shadow, was going that way that they stopped dead in their tracks like they knew what that shadow was supposed to be at that time, a day or something, I don't know, but it stopped dead in his tracks on a full trot and looked straight up in the air at me, directly below me. Dude, I was like no way did that buck just stop. I it was like on a leash. Well, I turned and just the buck broke and started to like haul ass out of there and literally I don't remember putting my side on it, nothing.
Speaker 3:I put the arrow exactly where I wanted it right top, left side of the show, right side of the shoulder boom and smoked it and drop that. So you know, I dislodged that part of the spine, like when you hit that front shoulder, and dude dropped him dead in the tracks right there and I was like dude, that's the best shot I've ever made in my life. Point where I'm going with this when it comes to a shotgun and me shooting a duck, like tristan was saying flying away a goose that gets caught in the wind whenever you call shoot them or whatever. Dude, I haven't figured that shit out yet. I just I have not.
Speaker 4:Sounds like you need to come practice in South Florida.
Speaker 3:I know it right, I know for sure, man, where was you all at down in Jacksonville?
Speaker 4:Just because we lived down there for so many years, there was I can't remember the name of the town, but it was on WW Ranch. I think it was a motocross track was there too?
Speaker 4:at the front of the property Interesting ranch. I think it was a motocross uh track was there, too, at the front of the property. Um, interesting remember the name of the town, though that we were in this was. This place was really popping back when I was young, like five, six, seven years old and I we closed it in 2016, I think, but I never spent a ton of time down there. More so.
Speaker 4:I spent a few weekends there when we had some tournaments and when I was getting lessons with my coach, ken, but that was a long time ago.
Speaker 2:And now you are in Quitman Georgia.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we're in Quitman, georgia Right, just west of Valdosta.
Speaker 2:Dang man. Yeah, next time I pass through because we go a good bit down to Orlando, my wife's mom lives in Winter Garden. Next time I pass through I'm going to have to come through and do some shooting.
Speaker 4:Come see us, come on.
Speaker 2:The Ducks Expo. We were just talking about that a little bit. What was your take on that whole thing? I thought it was pretty dang fun.
Speaker 4:Man, that was a blast. I've never been to an Expo like that before and I recently got on. Just I'm on the pro staff with Higdon and I'm on the pro staff with Migra and kind of wanted to go meet the guys in person, because I deal with them over the phone and talk to these people but I've never met them in person and I kind of got to go meet everybody, shake some hands and really do a little bit of networking.
Speaker 4:That was kind of my idea behind the whole event. I mean, yeah, it's cool to go see all the new products and go spend some money, which I certainly did. That I did not need to do.
Speaker 4:But, I had a great time met a lot of great people, made a lot of great contacts. A great time met a lot of great people, made a lot of great contacts and um, looking forward to a pretty good, fruitful season this, uh, this year and going hunting with a lot of these guys yeah, dude, from a networking standpoint that I tell everybody that I mean there really is no better place to be and that's really honestly our.
Speaker 2:Our motivation too is just kind of networking, exposure, kind of meeting, meeting the people we've talked to online, um those kind of things. Uh, what was there anything crazy that you bought, like anything? Uh, they're like man, I had to, I had to get that.
Speaker 4:I know you got that picture on the last day, but yeah, uh, it got me a pretty cool painting uh, you know add to my waterfowl collection, just kind of all my mounts that I've gotten done over the years and um, but probably most useful thing I got, and I'll shout this guy out. I can't remember the owner's name but, uh, swamp stick oh yeah um make a great product. Um, he really sold me on it there at the event. There's a lot of times that we go down to the coast and we're trying to lean our shotguns up against the some alameda bushes that we, you know, we made our homemade blind.
Speaker 4:Lean our shotguns up against the palmetto bushes that we, you know, we've made our homemade blind with, or leaning it up against the chair, or always. You know, saltwater eats everything. So we're trying to keep everything out of the saltwater, out of the sand there and, um, now they got the swamp stick. It'll, uh, it'll, keep my, my gear, my gun, everything out of the saltwater, out of the sand. Uh, that's probably the most useful piece that I, that I bought there.
Speaker 4:Um, and I easily say worth every penny that I spent on it. But um, guy had a great product, real small booth. But go up to him. Just like I said, networking meeting people, I saw something look pretty cool and went up and started talking to him about it. He had me sold pretty quick but uh the best, uh best piece that I bought.
Speaker 2:No, I feel you, man, I just got one of them. Um, similar, similar idea. Uh, shit, what's the company called Hi or hell a drive. I I got one of those last season and uh, but same same motivation I I just got so sick of. I mean, you know, you hunt. Some of the places we hunt in florida are, like you know, a reservoir type situation and like, let's say, you gotta take your. You can't take a boat in, so you gotta take a kayak in, and then you get set up kind of the same stuff we were hunting in in georgia together. But, like you know, when there's three foot of water there, it's like there's no good place to put a shotgun. So like you need something to be able to hang, hang your gun on, hang a backpack on.
Speaker 3:Like, yeah, dude, so many times we've just been sitting there. Just, you know it is. I mean, you're just, you're up to the top of your waders, you know. Trying to figure it out Before I lose this thought. I just got thinking, you know, when you were saying that, tristan, you know, depending on what public land area you go to, you know you always have like this guy that's got like this ingenious system to make something happen easier.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you see like a redneck system.
Speaker 3:Yeah, whatever Like. So one of the things I remember that I just got to go through this real quick because it was just so ingenious was I was at the STAs down in Florida and we're all getting there in the morning and you couldn't park like right there. You know what I mean. And if you had two guys you didn't want to have to like, I mean you could park way down and have one person run back, but you're just like losing time. These guys had their canoes on these portable wheels.
Speaker 2:I've seen those yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, I've got a set. I'm just looking at them up there and I've got them stowed away and I'm like those are going to sit there. I used them one time and they might sit there for 10 years. But 10 years from now I'm going to be like, and everybody's gonna be like dude, I, why didn't? I think of that? I mean, but don't we come up with some of the craziest shit? I mean really to make something happen oh yeah, hey, listen on them hunts.
Speaker 4:It's early and it's two o'clock, three o'clock, four o'clock or however early. You're out in the field or in a in a water hole, you and your buddy sitting there talking, passing the time, drinking coffee or, you know, ghost energy drink not good for your heart, but hey, you got to make it through the morning, right, we're like man, this would be genius.
Speaker 4:We need to do this Then day goes by, Hopefully, you kill a lot of birds, you make it home and you never think of it again until the next hunt. You're like man. We should have done that.
Speaker 3:That's like they say every great business idea starts in a garage over a bunch of beers, with guys. Right, I've seen, I've seen reels on that.
Speaker 2:That's so funny, dude, it's like dude, I've got a great business idea man, tell you what, when I love, I love when I finally get like an extended amount of time where I don't have anything going on, because that's like that's the only time I think of. You know, they're not all good ideas, obviously I'd be a millionaire but when I think of ideas or bad it's when I have some time, like when we were driving. This past weekend I went to a bachelor party down in Florida and on the way down there, katie, my wife, was working because she was going to stay at her mom's. And I'm driving and four hours goes by and she's like you haven't even listened to music or anything.
Speaker 3:I'm like I've just been sitting here thinking literally for four hours. Well, you're trying to process why she's working. Tap, tap, tap. Everything else is going on. You're like, dude, I haven't slept or I haven't been home in a week and I know, but that's right. You just you get so engaged with what life's got to offer you is that you do like really forget to take the time, just like when you do have that time, you're like, maybe I'm not dumb maybe I just haven't had time to think.
Speaker 2:A board, a board hunt. You know, a board hunt when you get to sit there and things.
Speaker 3:Nice sometimes oh it is, and and that's why I've always still I still to this day, I love to go deer hunting by myself. I do, I that I need it. I have to do it sometimes, and not that I don't love hunting with Tristan or whoever. I took, took Tessa and Selena out in a blind last year. You know, whatever it is, I love doing that, but there's something special about just doing it by yourself.
Speaker 3:Well, this year was the first time I was out there with Cade and, and it was a Sunday afternoon, and he the guys were butts were kicked from the weekend. Cade and, and it was a Sunday afternoon and he the guys were butts were kicked from the weekend. Cade's butt was kicked and I'm like, not me, I want to be out there duck hunting something. I go, can I just go out to one of the fields? And he's like I don't give a shit, and he goes, I go, I don't need any equipment, I want to bother you.
Speaker 3:I walked out there, walked like a long ways to get there, and and I come walking up and no shit, a speckled belly goose just falls from the sky. I didn't even have to do anything, I was just sitting there. I'm like I'm just going to go up against this wood line and shut up. I was only about 10 yards from the blind and smoke that one goose and to me that was peace. That was awesome and I sat out there for another two hours and I just remember just sitting there. Having time to think is where I'm going with that.
Speaker 2:It's just yeah, no doubt you got to do it I I know, dawson, you were saying growing up, you know you did a lot, or still do a lot, of duck hunting along the coast there in florida. Uh, we had the opportunity to do that this past year over at williamson outfitters and had a blast doing it. But you know, I'm curious, you know what have been some of the funnest hunts you've had down there on the coast and I know it's a lot of like redheads, typically some buffleheads. Has there been been anything crazy that you guys have shot over the years?
Speaker 4:man it's been. I think I've been hunting down there five or six years now and we get down there. Typically we don't go in in the mornings just because it's never I don't say never it's typically not as successful in the morning. So we get down there about lunchtime and hang out on the land and eat food and snacks and wait until the last 10 minutes of shooting time and that's when the tucks normally come in. But there's been times. Uh, let's see here. This was two years ago. We're sitting in the blind, me and my buddy zach. He met him last weekend and uh, or two weekends ago and uh, I got my dog with me. He's in the little uh mo marsh blind. I got for him and, um, great product. By the way, I don't know if y'all have one. Uh, you'll need one for your dog. I'm telling you.
Speaker 2:It's a, it's a great, great product but the ones that like fold up and you can stuck all, or stick all the stuff on the all the uh, grass on it and all that, that's right, that's right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, um, I mean you, you gotta be careful down there on the coast. Um, with your dogs on that salt water. Man, keep, keep, uh, keep water. I always take some Pedialyte for after the hunt and make him drink a lot of Pedialyte. That's a good tip.
Speaker 4:He's going to drink salt water the way he's down there. He ain't going to like it, but he's going to end up drinking it because it's natural. There in the water, retrieving the duck, they're going to drink some of it. We're sitting there, me and Zach are talking, not paying much attention it's probably 2 in the afternoon, just me and him. Normally we don't ever go down there, it's just the two of us but no one else can go and we had the day off. So we're like, well, let's run it, let's see what happens, and went and put out a bunch of decoys sitting on the island, ain't nothing happening. And my dog picks his head up and he kind of whines a little bit. He never whines, he's pretty quiet in the blind and uh, what's he wanted at?
Speaker 4:And it just so happened that that time, uh, the sun where it was glaring in our decoys pretty bad so we couldn't see that well. But when we stood up, there's a duck right there swimming through the decoys. Never heard it come in, never saw it. I shot, we both jumped up and it's flush and we shot and killed it and uh, he went out there and got it. It was gadwall. Whoa. Well, that's pretty cool it's. When do you shoot gadwalls like that's never happened to us? No, like I said, it's normally it's redheads or um buffleheads. They are maganzers, you know, good old maganzer but uh it's never something like that.
Speaker 4:That's probably the coolest bird we've shot down there, um, like that. We've killed some bluebills down there as well. Uh, but I think I heard one of our friend groups that hunts down there a lot. They killed a snow goose uh last season or season four, last um.
Speaker 4:I was like man that that goose was lost it was very lost but, uh, but yeah, um, we've been hunting for a few years now and, uh, we typically hunt, you know, all around the gulf in there and um, it's, uh, it's a good time, it's a lot of fun like this, a lot of sitting around, but gives us time to just hang out with buddies, talk, chit, chat and, you know, shoot the bull and and have a little fun while we're doing it yeah, and I would imagine you know I mean I haven't done it near as much, but like you know, when you a, when you got a small group, but b, you know you you're only getting like one to maybe three or four groups, I mean it seems like anyway, because it's like you get these big big groups to maybe three or four groups.
Speaker 2:I mean it seems like anyway, because it's like you get these big big groups to decoy though, but it's like you might get one or two and that's like you said, the last 10 minutes live, that can kind of be it for the day. Uh and and man, it would probably suck, if you know, if you're just two man hunt, you get your two redheads a piece and then you're just like getting redheads, that shit, on you over and over again, like that's right, man, we.
Speaker 4:So one of the first times we went down there I used to have a uh ebads layout boat and, um, we went down to the uh, to the coast, me and my buddy, zach, and my dad and my taxidermist were coming. Too well, their boat ended up tearing up and this little ebads layout I don't know if y'all seen them before, but uh, they're not very big, I mean, they're two people maximum with a few decoys. But we have that thing loaded down with decoys, me and him, our gear guns, and uh, we get out there, we drop everything off and then my dad calls like hey, can you come get us from the boat landing? It wasn't that far of a trip. I mean, yeah, I'll come get y'all. And in that little boat I have a nine horsepower mud buddy on the back of it nice and it's taking forever to get back.
Speaker 4:I finally I get there, my phone. I've been missed three calls from zach and I just dropped him off in 15 minutes ago and uh he says hey, uh are you on the way back yet? I'm like no, I just made it to the boatland and picked him up. He's like well, uh, can you go ahead and come on back?
Speaker 4:uh, we're done hunting like we mean we're done, we ain't even started, it left you, you're putting decoys out. He said group come in and I shot twice and I accidentally shot three. He said I hit two in one shot and you know we got one more bird, so you gotta come shoot it.
Speaker 4:And I'm like what the heck man you know, I didn't even get to hunt dad and I may end up just turning around going home because, like I said, with the boat trouble and they didn't want to get getting my little surfboard with a motor, basically. But all right, they uh, I went back, got my one bird and we packed us up, came on home. I mean, those hunts can go like that you can get down there and be halfway through setting your decoys out and a big group of birds come in. There's two of you and limits to a piece on uh redheads and yeah, that's the hunt, that's it no man unless
Speaker 2:you can wait on some buffleheads or some agansas to come through or occasional blue bill, but typically it's it's mainly redheads on us yeah, I think I think every hunter's kind of thought or came close to that situation or had that situation Cause, like, especially, you know, you get a big wad of teal or and you got a lot of guys shooting or, um, you know, whatever it might be like we did, we did a blue bill hunt last year and uh, at Merritt Island and I'm just saying that because it's a lottery or it's a national wildlife refuge lottery area and there's a lot of different spots to hunt. So I'm not giving anything away. But you know, blue bills it's only one a piece, so you get big groups, but it's kind of like you can't even really shoot into the big groups because you're like you only get one, so you're sitting there waiting for like a pretty one to come by, and also, you know, when there's not, you know, 30 of them landing in the decoys.
Speaker 2:So that's right I, I heard a story, um, oh, it's a show dude. Yeah, I heard a story, um, I guess it was a few few years ago, where uh, and I forget who was even telling me, but they were teal hunting in arkansas and, uh, they shot. They needed, like you know, you need six obviously, and I think it was like a group came in, he dropped three with one shot, so then he went from having five to eight or something like that, and uh, he went and picked him up because he's like, well, I didn't mean to do that but I did, and uh, the game warden ended up giving him a hard time about it or whatever. But, uh, because I guess the game warden saw it go down and was asking about the birds or whatever, which I think I'm getting the story Right. But I, uh, I've just always thought, if that ever happened, I would just be totally honest, but I did like, I mean, I'm like it's kind of hard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like if I ever got you know that happened I'd be like man. When you get a group like that, you need one more bird. You know shit happens. You know I'll take the ticket and obviously I'm not trying to cheat the system.
Speaker 3:Well, I think most of the time it's a good game warden if you call, if you call in at least this is what I've seen publicly on tv. If you see a person that calls in making their mistake, they usually will you have to pay restitution for the animal, which is fine, because what you're doing with restitution for that is you're paying for that meat to go somewhere, all right. So if it's like a deer or something like that, they might charge you.
Speaker 2:Well, don't they uh, uh, like, uh, assess a value to what they think? It costs the state to regrow that asset or whatever, yeah, yeah, exactly. So I mean not, an animal, an asset, I guess yeah, but no.
Speaker 3:But so reasonably thinking yeah, I mean you, you broke the law, you took the risk and that happened. It's just like no different than if you can only shoot one turkey and there's two gobblers in front of you, you've got to wait for sure that one clears. Or if you have a buck next to a doe and you only got a buck tag, you've got to make sure that that buck's clear. You know, you see it with people that they do it all the time when you're talking about rifle hunting that's a little bit different though it's a little bit controlled versus a spread of a shotgun, I know.
Speaker 3:But you still put yourself at risk in that situation, no different than you know. What I love about kade is, every time we have like a good shoot, he will like stop short of the limit, yeah, he'll stop short of the limit and just say, just in case there's cripples out there, yeah, and he'll be more than safe about it. Like he'll say, like I'm not even gonna shoot my limit yeah you know, and something like that, which is just.
Speaker 3:I mean you can be proactive with it, but I'm not taking what you're away from, what that story was.
Speaker 4:It's just that's an unfortunate situation and you just gotta bite the bullet, I guess yeah, yeah, well, yeah I've been on on several hunts where you know we've been closed and it's like, hey guys, we got to stop, we got to make it count, we got to figure out where we're at, because you get excited in those moments, man, you can make a mistake. And, like you said about talking to the game warden, I'm cool with game wardens, I appreciate their jobs. I'm glad they're out there to kind of regulate those other people that are not as respectful towards the, to the waterfowl or the industry or any type of game like that. Um, I mean, god gave us that game. We gotta, we gotta take measures to preserve it. At the same time, I mean, yeah, it's fun to hunt it, but we got to be sure they're going to be around for generations to come. That's right.
Speaker 4:Um, you know, I thought you know there's been several times that I've had to talk to the game where I've never gotten a ticket. I'm just honest with them. You know, like I said, I've never done anything wrong in the times that I've been checked. But you just got to be straight up with them Like yes, sir, no sir, you know you give them the respect you know that you want to, how you would want to be talked to and nine times out of 10, they're going to give you that same respect back and and be real with you. You know, but it's at times that you, they come up and then you're automatically being a douche bag to them and not respecting them at all. And I mean, why would he want to be easy on you? You know you're being disrespectful to him or rude to him. He's just trying to do his job.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, yeah, if you don't feel like you're on the same team as a game warden, then you need to do a checkup from the neck up, honestly, because now I'm not going to take away. There are isolated game wardens that we all know, them that were like we could sit here and just trash the small percentage of what that is. But the majority of game wardens that are out there, they're out there to protect our resources, they're out there to make sure we stay safe, and that's one of the two big things that they're going after. And if you don't support that, then I don't know, maybe you need to take a look.
Speaker 4:I'll tell you this real quick story. There was a group that I'm buddies with back home. They hunted a lake close to our hometown that I'm buddies with back home. They hunted a lake close to our hometown and at the end of the day they go out of the lake. Game warns are at the boat ramp and said, you know, they had their legal limit. Everything was good. They all had their license, their plugs, the right ammo. I mean they were straight across the board and he said, am I going to find bait out there? And they said no. And the game warn watched them where they hunted. I mean, watched them from the boat ramp, saw where they were hunting. Well, he went out there and found another group that was hunting on the other side of the lake. Now, I ain't talking two-acre par and I'm talking big, big lake. Yeah.
Speaker 4:On the complete other side of it and he found bait where they were hunting. He called those boys back to the lake that he had already checked that morning and gave them all bait tickets oh, that's not right and it was like why?
Speaker 4:why are we getting a ticket? We weren't hunting over. You watched us where we hunted, like you saw us where we were all morning, because we saw you on the boat landing. We were illegal across the board and you're going to give us a bait ticket for something that was hundreds and hundreds of yards away from us. He said you were hunting in baited water they took it and they got dropped. But I mean it's stuff like that. It's like come on, man, you already got people that are out for you.
Speaker 3:Don't want to give them more ammo dude, I almost got a ticket from a game warden in illinois for having a. Um, what are those? You know the fluorescent lights. It's like one of those emergency light radio things oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, he pulled it out of the back of my jeep and goes, and what is this? And I go. Are you shitting me right now, like you can give me a ticket for my headlights way before you could that. I mean that cause, you know.
Speaker 3:I mean headlights are the same as having a spotlight, you know or whatever, but that's the kind of thing I don't like is like, when they're trying to take they can look at my history and see that I bought a license all these years since I was a kid. You know what I mean, you know, and if I did something wrong, I'd do something wrong. I almost got a ticket one time because I shot a bearded hen and my first turkey and I shot it with a bow and I'm like this is I think it's a hen, and so I took it in. I was so excited, I took it right up to the ranger station in this wma in illinois to show it to him, because I'm like, dude, this is cool. And he's like where's the tag at? Like I haven't put it on it yet.
Speaker 3:Honestly, god, I was so excited to bring it up here and show you guys. He's like you're lucky I don't write. I mean, that's the attitude he had, not congratulations. And hey, you know what, bud, I know you've been around for a minute. I mean I was like a 30 year old guy, right, you know? Right, dude, just be straight up with me and don't be a douche. You know what I mean. But but I honestly, those in the, in the grand scheme of things, those are isolated situations, right, I mean they really are. I mean most of the game wardens that are out there, out there to help us protect the thing that we love.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, no doubt, dawson. So we've talked on this podcast, like I said before, a hundred times and if I hear the story one more time from our mouths I'm sick of hearing the story. But I want to hear your take on that morning in Georgia that we had together. Please start it out with your scouting, because because that was that was pretty cool, man, just I mean it that have 16 guys like basically all shoot a limit, I mean on public ground and nowhere georgia I mean that that?
Speaker 2:was pretty damn cool and yeah we smug that morning.
Speaker 4:That was so much no yeah, so uh, I personally I was not on the I guess, the guys that went scouting for our hunt that morning, um, they went down that week of and, uh, scouted the hole out, rode the, rode the rivers and went up on the levee. Same thing. They spotted a few birds and they didn't see what y'all saw on y'all scouting part, but they saw enough birds to say, hey, let's go, guys, let's do it. And they actually ran into those coast guard guys while they were down there scouting. And you know, kind of have y'all mentioned before, like there's a very small space to hunt here. It's obvious we're all going to end up in the same spot if we're any good at scouting. So there's like, hey, guys, let's link up that morning off, let's make it happen together.
Speaker 4:And, um, and and it was kind of one of those things, two of the guys in our group, uh, one of them owns a restaurant and one of the guys works for him there at the restaurant and so he uh, he's pretty busy with that till late in the night and couldn't go the day before. But me and another guy went the day before and made it down there, met up with the Coast Guard guys and went out on the, started going down the river, made it up onto the levee. That's where we run into y'all and kind of well, let's go over and talk to them to see, because I'm pretty sure if we're both stopping at the same spot in the levee we're probably going to the same place. So we kind of made our way over there to y'all or we kind of met there in the middle and all decided like, hey, let's do this together.
Speaker 4:Man, you know we got more on the way, but if y'all cool with it, we're cool with it and no reason to try to argue over it or anything. Y'all I mean y'all would beat us there. And uh, you know it worked out able to hunt together and we, you know it worked out able to hunt together. And you know, there that evening, or late into the night, into the morning, we hung out there on the levee. I think someone brought sausage dogs and we cooked sausage dogs out there on the levee.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you know we all took a little nap or some of us took a nap swatting mosquitoes and hanging out telling stories. And then, you know, we all decide there I think I can't remember if it's right before we started crossing that big ditch. But you know, one thing that sticks out to me that I love and I don't do it enough, but man saying that, saying that prayer, right there before the hunt, you know bless that hunt. Have a good, successful hunt. That was awesome and um no, we don't.
Speaker 2:We don't do that enough either. I thought that was kind of a cool, just spur-of-the-moment thing.
Speaker 4:That's right. And we made our way across and that was a long, long walk and I videoed part of that walk on my phone and it's just a trail of headlights. All you see is headlights up in front of me and behind me and it's like a snake just going through the bushes. We were walking everything but a straight line, and I think we made that walk five times longer than what it needed to be, but we finally made it to water and then birds started getting up off the water and it was just like this is it, guys we are going to absolutely wear these things out.
Speaker 2:Oh my God, I remember looking at the map I actually did like on HuntW hunt wise. It was 700 yards, I think to, to where we all set up right, man crossing that.
Speaker 4:Ditch too, man, I if it's. I'm glad we had that. You know that rug we had there to cross that one deep boggy part.
Speaker 2:Dude getting getting across using the canoe, yeah I was about to say y'all kind of saved us on that deal, because I don't think we brought a canoe or something and I don't know how we thought we were going to get across. But I don't even think we brought a canoe.
Speaker 3:No, dude, we brought all those two by tens.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it didn't work. That's what it was. Is that what it was?
Speaker 3:No, we brought the two by tens, needed the crates or the the pallets that they had. Yes, so it truly would not have happened without combined resources.
Speaker 4:Yeah oh 100 like it wasn't using that canoe to get across that thing and shuttling everybody and making that long walk, and then you know, I hate it for the, for the one guy I keep forgetting his name, yeah man, he was having a tough time but, you know, glad that we could get everybody out there and get set up.
Speaker 4:I remember he was because y'all set up a little bit further out than we did, if I remember right and y'all were crossing that wet area, yeah and uh, he made it about halfway and we're kind of getting our stuff set up and I look, and he, you could just tell in his face, man, I had like hit his face and he was done.
Speaker 4:Poor boy dude, that was tough me and me and tristan just made our way out there too, and we kind of met him in the middle and I took his gun and me and you both grabbed his shoulder and helped him up and we got him across and he said guys, I can't help with decoys or nothing, I'm sitting right here until the end of this oh boy, that was how I went down too.
Speaker 2:He just Hunter, just I was talking to him a couple weeks ago and he goes, man. He's like I can't wait to get out and hunt with you guys again this year, he's like, but if you find Teal again, don't invite me.
Speaker 3:No but here let me take something back, and I do this all the time just because I'm an older guy and you guys do this shit when you get my age. But I just love that I have these resources available to me, because I have so many years, like most of my life, that I don't have those resources available to me. You know what I mean, like to recall a hunt it's just a memory or a polaroid that my mom sent me or you know, um, something like that. And you know I'll sit there and I'll watch this video and just break it down a thousand times. You know, I mean, probably out of the over 10,000 views that we got, like probably 300 is legit mine. But just as an old guy, I just sit there and I'm just like man. I think about what you all think about it when you're my age and truly I don't think that something like that will ever happen again in my life.
Speaker 3:And it was the biggest risk. I mean, I had to pull money out of my pocket when finances weren't good to help pay Dalton. That gave me an incredible deal to film it, but it was still like if this doesn't turn out to be a video my CFO that lives in this house with me is going to shut this shit down Like she is going to shut it down. But the thing that I remember the most, you guys, is when you watched that part and Tristan, you did such a good job with the music and Dalton getting that far back view of us all with headlights, working hard to bring everything through, and you couldn't see it in the dark in that video. Folks, but we're passing along people's guns, just everything that everybody needed.
Speaker 3:It was just a nobody even like had to manage the crew. Everybody just snapped into this mode of like we're all working together, yeah. And then when we heard those birds get up, bro, do you remember that? Oh it, like it like made my, it almost made my heart jump a beat, or like a flutter in my ear, like almost popped or something it was. So I was like holy shit. Oh my god, dude, this is gonna be, this is gonna be stupid, this is gonna be stupid and um it just to me, that's one of the small pieces of that that I'll never forget is just listen to every one of y'all, everybody that was there, those voices in the dark. You know it's like did you hear that shit and somebody's like I'm setting up over here, though no, you're not get your ass over here, you know honestly like it would have.
Speaker 2:I wish that we could have had two camera guys and had one on y'all too, because that would have showed just the, the intensity the craziness of the of the hunt from. I mean we so with six guys we shot 29 over on our side and then you guys all 10, you guys shot six. So I mean it's like, if I remember right, I mean it was just like you guys had that.
Speaker 3:What was that cyclone thing you guys had going?
Speaker 4:wow, oh man, yeah. So we got two of them now, maybe it worked bro, that was the freaking crack, yeah yeah, it was. I can't remember. It's a cyclone or tornado or something, but it's. I believe it's a Mojo product, but one of the guys in the group brought it.
Speaker 3:It kind of looks like clones.
Speaker 4:He's like man, this is the secret weapon, this is it, man, this is what's going to do it. Nobody else has one, and I'm like yeah because everyone's not dumb enough to use something like this it's a car battery right, yeah, we carried a car battery out there.
Speaker 4:So he puts this thing up and I'm thinking to myself I'm like man, if this does work, it's going to be amazing. But carrying in that battery, because we had it in a backpack, we had it strapped to the back of a backpack and I think I had that backpack, that plus my gear. And someone brought a sled, I believe, and we used that too yeah, I remember helpful, but not everybody's gear can fit in that sled, obviously.
Speaker 4:So everybody's backpacking stuff, everybody's got guns. I just remember my bag being so heavy from that car battery I I forgot about the battery.
Speaker 4:Honestly, you just said something but it has uh, I want to say uh, because we couldn't just leave the battery there at the bottom of the cyclone because it was kind of out in a little bit deeper water and uh, the battery is up on the bank. I want to say it was like a 40 50 foot line that we had to run out there, so like we're trying not to trip on it or walking out there, which, luckily, one of our guys brought his dog and man, that dog war, he did a phenomenal, or she did a phenomenal job picking up birds for us that day yeah and uh, buddy of my gym and he, he spends a lot of time training, does does really really great with all of his dogs, has successful dogs and um, but how?
Speaker 3:fun was it I was go ahead.
Speaker 4:I was supposed to bring my dog that day, but down in that area is very common for gators, bad gators. Yeah.
Speaker 4:You may want to beat that name out, but anyways, I went down there. I couldn't do it, man, I wasn't going to put my dog in that situation. I mean, that's my boy. It's hard to put your dog in a known situation where there's common gators. When we got down there and I shot in the light across that levee, I didn't see any eyes and I was kicking myself. I was like man, I should have brought my dog.
Speaker 2:Well, I will say, not to go on a tangent here, but the water was so low that time, that probably played a role in it. And I might like I was so low that time, that probably played a role in it. And I'm not like, yeah, like I know, you probably know that too, dawson but the next year when we went out to the same spot and the water was three foot across that whole pool, we counted 62 gators at one time in frame from the levee in frame insane bro yeah, no, dude, no, it was just man.
Speaker 3:I don't know. I will take that one to the grave, I certainly will. And the fact that you guys did the work too, and that we and I'll tell you what got me into duck hunting loving duck hunting was, honestly. The first time I ever went was on a quota draw, and it was one of those environments that like if a bird flew over you and you missed them and went over to another blind and they smoked them, everybody yelled like hell. Yeah, you know, it was just like woo, you know, and you guys.
Speaker 3:I remember you guys had that first volley and just wrecked them. I don't know how many you wrecked in that first volley, but I remember all of us.
Speaker 4:I don't think many got out of that first volley.
Speaker 3:No, no, dude, you guys rained them out, I think. And, and, dude, we screamed across there let's, you know, let's go. And then you guys would be like waiting for us, and you know some would come past you and come over and hit us and we'd rock them and you guys would scream at us.
Speaker 4:That was fun doing that back and forth it's like oh yeah, it's like a dove shoot yeah, or if you, if you missed a bunch of here, somebody go, come on I do remember one part we kind of laugh about it now I may have said something to tristan about it, but we looked over one time it was kind of towards the end of the hunt things were starting to die out a little bit and y'all were taking the opportunity, when there's a little bit of break, to, I think, get some some b-roll, some, some videos and stuff like that. Yeah, and like a kind of a small group of birds flew right over y'all.
Speaker 4:We're like screaming and yelling at each other, Dude I remember that Y'all were over there taking pictures with the mojo and we're like no, shoot the birds no.
Speaker 3:No, dude, you actually have a video of that on the video Tristan, but you dubbed it in a different spot and it's one of those. Right towards the end, before it switches to day two, there's this giant group of birds that flies from us and nobody does anything yeah yeah, and that's what that was, I remember that that was at the end of that hunt.
Speaker 4:I was like I'm never ever video in a hunt because I'm not gonna miss the opportunity to shoot birds now looking back at it.
Speaker 4:Me and a buddy are wanting to start our own little social media thing and I don't care to sell backpacks or sell shirts, you know, like a lot of people are doing now, which I mean that helps create money for your, you know, to pay for your hunts or pay for to get you more credit or, I guess, more videos, and yeah, but like I just want to video the story man, I just want to video our hunts. Yeah, kind of really, I guess, for ourselves you know, yeah, and we post them.
Speaker 3:We post them but like really just for ourself well, dude, um, I'll tell you this too, and this is what the video doesn't depict, and it's just because I wish I would have done a better job with it is that second day, um, I was so like mad about they were everybody's done, they've shot their birds. And I'm like, dude, I got to shoot my limit and it was one of those where we said we're going to pick up the decoys and literally one came flying over the top and I was just, I was keeping a gun in my shell. That one time, right when you're like, man, no birds are going to come, we're picking up our decoys, dude, that's when I got my limit and that sealed it for me. Personally, I was like all right, done, deal, so anyway. But man, where can everybody follow you and catch up with you, bro?
Speaker 4:uh, so my instagram dtpeak2016 um, and then you know. If you want to book a quail hunt, I just throw my personal number in. You're more welcome to call it out 229-415-6028. Give me a shout. I can give you a little bit of information about our gun range. If you want to come shoot, or if you're in the area or passing through, come book a quail hunt. It's a lot of fun. If you book it on a Friday, saturday, sundayay, I'm probably gonna be the guide for it, um, but uh, yeah, wanting to keep up with, uh, our hunting life and kind of how we do things, or if you want to get a shooting lesson in, or if you want to, uh, just come practice or shoot some quail, hit me up sounds good, man.
Speaker 2:Well, it was great, great talking, glad we got to see at the ducks expo and hopefully we'll find ourselves in a blind somewhere in one one of these states, uh, this fall well, and certainly you get up here in atlanta area, bud, you let us know and, uh, we'll grab a beer coffee or something.
Speaker 4:Next time I try to steer as far clear as I possibly can well, we're on northeast side, outside the perimeter, so we okay all right. Yeah, that's all right then.
Speaker 3:It's livable.
Speaker 4:There you go, there you go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know, maybe one of these days when we do a podcast in the studio, that'd be fun.
Speaker 4:I might be able to catch up with you at a banquet here coming up pretty soon, I hope. Oh, that's right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the Chattahoochee.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, and then, um, so it's you and your buddy, and then we got I think two other people have I've joined in so far, so I think we're at six total, so you fit 10 at a table. So if you're listening this and you're in the georgia area and you want to join in with us at the uh, our local delta waterfowl banquet october 24th, hit us up. We're going to do like a group table thing.
Speaker 3:So what city is? Is that in?
Speaker 2:Noon in Georgia.
Speaker 3:Noon in Georgia.
Speaker 2:So we're out on man. Well, thank you so much, Dawson, and uh, yeah, it's one hell of a life.
Speaker 3:It's one hell of a life, Dawson.
Speaker 4:That's right, that's right.
Speaker 3:I agree, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Can't wait to see it on a midnight train going too fast now think I'll slow down standing in the pouring rain.