Ian: The Valley Giant, The story Of A 180 Inch Plus Buck

A valley can make or break a buck’s future. Ours is long, narrow, and guarded by marsh and pasture—difficult to access, perfect for letting deer get old. That’s where Logan’s story unfolds: years of shared neighbor intel, a “let it grow” culture, and a chessboard of food plots, pinch points, and big old trees that set the stage for one of the largest  New Brunswick giants we’ve ever laid eyes on.

We walk through the real work behind a “once-in-a-lifetime” tag. Logan breaks down how he shifted from casual sits to intentional strategy—mapping doe movement, timing hunts around cold fronts, and treating trail cameras as tools instead of truth. You’ll hear about the summer sightings across tall marsh grass, late-January shed clues a kilometer apart, and the frustration of slow seasons that still hide daylight activity just out of frame. When the weather flipped and a rare northeast wind finally aligned, small choices mattered most: an early walk-in to trim lanes, a missing saw, and the discipline to move slow on crunchy frost.

Then everything happened fast. Antlers raked cedars. A tiny window opened through two branches. The shot broke. Twenty yards later, the woods went still. We cover the recovery, the friends sprinting in from work, and the green score that puts this mainframe twelve near the 190 mark gross and around 180 net typical. More important than numbers are the takeaways: how to hunt a pressured corridor, why access outranks almost everything, and how consistent doe habitat pays off when the rut locks down.

If you care about whitetail strategy—access, wind, fronts, cameras, food plots, and community management—this story will hit home and sharpen your plan for the next cold morning. Subscribe, share this with your hunting crew, and leave a quick rating or review to help more folks find the show. What’s your valley move when the wind finally turns?

Check us out on Facebook Hunts On Outfitting, or myself Ken Marr. Reach out and Tell your hunting buddies about the podcast if you like it, Thanks!

Chapters

• 0:00 Opening, Guest Tease, Big-Buck Hook
• 1:21 Shoutouts, Reviews, And Sponsor Plug
• 3:10 Meet Logan And The 190-Class Buck
• 5:30 The Valley: Land Layout And Access
• 9:10 Let It Grow Culture And Neighbor Network
• 12:15 Early Hunting Journey And First Bucks
• 17:15 First History With “Ian” And Other Giants
• 22:20 Genetics, Sheds, And Bloodlines
• 26:40 Summer Patterns, Food Plots, And Cameras
• 32:10 Slow Starts, Rethinking Setups, New Stand
• 37:50 Rut Timing, Patterns, And Daylight Intel
• 43:10 Pressure, Trespass, And Communication
• 48:10 Weather, Wind Strategy, And Patience
• 52:40 The Day It Happened: Morning Hunt
• 56:40 The Decision: Go Early, Cut Lanes
• 59:40 Crunchy Walk-In, Spooked Buck, Reset
• 1:02:20 The Shot Through Cedars And The Collapse
• 1:06:20 Reactions, Calls, And Recovery Crew

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:11

This is Hunt Tun Outfitting Podcast. I'm your host and rookie guide, Ken Meyer. I love everything hunting, the outdoors, and all things associated with it. From stories to how-tos, you'll find it here. Welcome to the podcast. Hey, how's it going, guys, gals? Welcome, welcome back. Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode. We got a great one for you. So hard work, time, dedication, and a bit of shit luck. These, among some other things, were needed and used to help today's guest harvest a buck that most all of us can only see in our dreams. A true monster of a deer. If you look at the podcast profile picture, you can see how it ends. But how did it start with a deer of that caliber? Was there history, close calls over the years, and more? Well, lucky enough, Logan is gonna uh uh tell us uh and take us along his journey for Ian. How'd he get that name? That's the name Logan gave to, and that we'll find out later on. It's uh it's a good story. Uh so we're happy to have you guys listening. As always, ratings and reviews do help from each and every one of you. I know you guys listening right now are probably driving or something, but if you're listening on Apple or Spotify, if you get a chance to leave a rating or review, it's much appreciated. Uh for the Canadian listeners, Canadian Access to Firearms in print magazine, sent right to your door to show you the latest on guns, gear, all the reloading supplies, your optics, the best deals, who's fighting for your firearm rights, what provinces are doing what, that and so much more is going to be found in that magazine. And it's very affordable. And uh I I don't know, I just like having especially this time of year in the winter time, sitting by the fire or you know, whatever, having an in-print magazine, not just scrolling through your phone, but something physically in your hands to be looking through. I don't know, I like it. Just call me old fashioned, I guess. But uh enough of all that. You guys uh you guys came here to hear a story of a big buck, as you can see from the profile picture. So let's meet Logan. Oh, and if you were looking to get a hold of us to maybe come on the podcast or suggest somebody for it, or just reach out to me, you can email me, hunts on outfitting at gmail.com, or you can find us on Facebook, Hunts on Outfitting, or find myself on there, Ken Meyer. Feel free to reach out. Some of you guys have been. It's been great talking with you from all over. No, it's uh it's pretty cool shooting big bucks, and uh luckily the three of us in this room have been fortunate enough to partake in such an activity. But um I'm excited for this week because Logan, we're rolling. You're looking at me kind of funny, so we're rolling. Um I'm excited to talk to you, get to know the story behind this huge deer. I mean, it's not every day that you have a friend come into the podcast studio with damn near 190-inch buck.

SPEAKER_02: 3:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 3:16

Caleb, you're slacking. No, you're you're de you were in here around this time last year, I think, with your big deer.

SPEAKER_00: 3:22

Yeah, it was Remembrance Day, November 11th when I shot that. Yes, it would be about this time last year, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 3:27

That's very uh patriotic of you. You were you were showing the veterans that thanks for fighting for my freedom, and I'm gonna shoot a big deer.

SPEAKER_00: 3:35

Yep, and remember.

SPEAKER_04: 3:36

I had my poppy on that day.

SPEAKER_01: 3:37

Good. You should.

SPEAKER_04: 3:39

Um I still don't even know what day of the week it is. It just all blend together lately.

SPEAKER_01: 3:43

You've been on a bit of a bender from celebrating, have you, Logan?

SPEAKER_03: 3:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 3:48

Um so this week got Caleb sitting in. Caleb's been on the podcast before. He's the ginger carpenter. And uh Logan, you've been on you've been on quite a few times before, but uh let's get to know you, Logan. Is uh is the farming sales person. You sell farm equipment. Andy farm. How's farm sales coming? We're in we're into the fall right now. The farmer's kind of stocking up a bit for uh the winter, checking out some new toys.

SPEAKER_04: 4:12

Already getting ready for spring. Obviously, well, I took a little bit of time off for hunting season, but I'm actually back to work tomorrow off vacation. I'm not really that excited for it because I definitely have some stuff to do. But at this point, I don't really care. No, I mean yeah. I'm fine with going back to work and working a little extra hard now. It doesn't bother me as much.

SPEAKER_01: 4:28

No, well, I mean, yeah, you your time off uh was utilized quite well.

SPEAKER_04: 4:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 4:32

Uh what's uh what's a popular item that's selling this year? What are you selling a lot of?

SPEAKER_04: 4:36

Mowers. Hay mowers.

SPEAKER_01: 4:37

Hay mowers, yeah. Yeah, a lot of hay mowers for the three-point hit like the butterfly ones, like the thirty, thirty-five foot wide hay mowers.

SPEAKER_04: 4:45

That's yeah, already got some pre-sold for next spring.

SPEAKER_01: 4:47

So a lot of shit spreaders. See, I thought that'd be a popular item too.

SPEAKER_04: 4:50

A lot of shit spreaders, not this time of year, but guys are already looking for next year. So are they? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 4:54

Yep. You guys sell what? Crone?

SPEAKER_04: 4:56

Crone hay equipment.

SPEAKER_01: 4:58

That's real good stuff. Out of Ontario, is it? Or Europe?

SPEAKER_04: 5:01

Germany.

SPEAKER_01: 5:02

Oh, well, close. Ontario's you know a plane ride to Germany.

SPEAKER_04: 5:06

Just across the pond.

SPEAKER_01: 5:07

Yeah, across the pond, yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 5:08

I was gonna I was about to say, Ken, you don't get around much, but you are a truck driver.

SPEAKER_01: 5:11

I get around. Uh work-wise, not you know, I'm not like a man whore. Um I'm a married man. Like the person sitting across from me. You guys are both sitting across from me, so we'll let the viewers decide. No, it's kidding. Um so uh so Logan, you've got a hell of a deer. Uh I'm excited to get the story. I know you've got some history with it. I know we'll talk a bit too. The neighbors have some history with it. This deer was not a secret. This wasn't like, yeah, I had this show up in camera, and no one else knew about it, and I kept it real quiet. Like this deer was known, and there was uh there were some people after him pretty hard, and you were the lucky one to be able to pull the trigger on him.

SPEAKER_04: 5:44

Yeah, we'll get to the story how I tried to hunt pretty smart all year, but it ended up kind of with a lucky finish. But some days it's better to be lucky than lucky than good.

SPEAKER_01: 5:52

I'll take luck any day.

SPEAKER_04: 5:53

Yeah, so I tried to. I guess the way I show I I did but the best I could all year in the last following years on um because I got uh I'm sixth generation on our family farm at home.

SPEAKER_01: 6:03

Is that called uh century fare?

SPEAKER_04: 6:08

Isn't that quite well I mean it's been there over a century. Yeah, it's looks like a special century fair. I guess it would it would qualify. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 6:14

All right, that's just a few years. Century and a half farm. I don't know. Okay.

SPEAKER_04: 6:17

About yeah, back to mid well, late 1800s, I guess.

SPEAKER_03: 6:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 6:21

But uh yeah, farm runs down a farm runs down a big valley, uh long, narrow property, which is uh nice to have for fields, not the best for hunting whitetails, I guess, considering the property total property stretches about three kilometers long, but at the max width, it's only eight, nine hundred yards wide where the where the jawd out is like it's a very long, narrow stretch going through this valley. It pretty much runs to the whole other side where the other road is. But to uh to hunt a whitetail that's moving side to side, he's not really hanging around and walking up and down my field all day, or this would be a lot easier.

SPEAKER_01: 6:57

So I want to talk. So, Logan, you're based in say southeastern New Brunswick. Yep. And um, I mean, from the stuff that's been on Facebook and like said us three, you know, we've been fortunate to take New Br take Big Deer. New Brunswick's another. I was talking to a guy the other week about Nova Scotia, but New Brunswick too. I don't want to send everybody here, but it's another sleeper province for big deer.

SPEAKER_04: 7:15

Well, there's been some like we well, yours went boon and crockett. Yeah. Yep. So like we're all us three are sitting here at well, can't be.

SPEAKER_01: 7:23

Mine's not one mine's not boon 154 net. So not Boone and Crockett.

SPEAKER_04: 7:28

Either way, that is But I mean, and then this I would never let that deer walk the one I'm looking at on the wall across me, I'd never let it walk by.

SPEAKER_01: 7:34

I know, so just giving it one more year.

SPEAKER_04: 7:35

Um, but anyway, we've all been like fortunate enough to come across big deer, and even mine might be just under Booney Crockett, I think, actually.

SPEAKER_01: 7:43

Okay, let's get a little humble here.

SPEAKER_00: 7:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 7:45

But even in in our friend group as a whole, like there's been some really good deer getting dropped in the last last few years, and just even on uh local Facebook pages for hunting our own. Yeah. We just even this evening we saw another monster absolute monster just dropped.

SPEAKER_01: 7:59

Yeah. Yeah. I mean New Brunswick people.

SPEAKER_04: 8:01

Where was that?

SPEAKER_00: 8:02

Uh Ken and I aren't tagged out yet this year. Well that deer's dead too.

SPEAKER_01: 8:06

So But I mean, New Brunswick people think you know when they think Canada, they're thinking the West, they're thinking Alberta, Saskatchewan, maybe Manitoba. That's where the all the big bucks are. And there is, there's some there. But I think the Maritime Province, well, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, massive, massive deer. You know, it it's it's crazy what can produce here. But where you got your deer, Logan, that's not the first big deer taken out of there, but you think that valley is because it's what a mixture of agr a lot of agriculture land, nice cedar swamps, stuff like that. Like, what do you think? There's minerals in there that's growing these big bucks? Like, what is it?

SPEAKER_04: 8:39

Could be a form of good mineral and just the fact of I think a lot of it's the fact of longevity.

SPEAKER_01: 8:44

They can hide well.

SPEAKER_04: 8:46

It's a secluded spot. It's a secluded spot with lots of hide, and not many people have access to it.

SPEAKER_01: 8:51

Right.

SPEAKER_04: 8:52

And the people that do have access to it are people and I can't say myself, but even my neighbors who are both fantastic hunters and them have taken some fantastic They're big buck hunters. Yeah, they're big buck hunters, and they have shot some phenomenal, absolute phenomenal deal that I've even had more history with than than the buck I'm sitting beside here right now. But it's um it's a big valley, and it's like between the field land access to it, it's all marsh on both sides, and between one giant pasture that's a rented pasture that there's no access through, which runs 600 acres of just pasture that no one can get down to the woods of the valley from that side, versus the other side being owned by a big big dairy farm, with another one of my good friends in between me and that dairy farm, and then my two other friends hunting the west side of me.

SPEAKER_01: 9:37

And everyone's kind of on the same page about like let's not shoot a spike horn.

SPEAKER_04: 9:40

Yeah, and I mean like and I didn't really get into hunting deer. I mean, I've hunted deer all my life, but when I was going through high school and in college, until I turned about twenty-two or three, I'm twenty-eight now, I never really went hard at hunting white tail deer. I went hunting.

SPEAKER_02: 9:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 9:58

But you just I went hunting. I went and sat in the back of the field, and if a nice deer walked out, I would shoot it. But that was about the extent of my whitetail hunting. And I waterfowl hunted really hard, and then the boys started switching to a couple of the boys got a couple good deer, and then they switched into deer hunting, so I had no one to waterfowl hunting with. So they got into shooting. Well, we s we had some good shoots this year. I saw it. And then like my first my first buck, I didn't shoot my first buck till I was twenty-two.

SPEAKER_01: 10:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 10:21

Because I just I never was that into it. I never really I went and sat, but going to sit only does you so much. Right.

SPEAKER_00: 10:26

What was it? What was your first year?

SPEAKER_04: 10:28

Just a little bit, just a tightest basket seven point. Yeah. You could have yeah, I went back, I was hauling hay all day, and uh ran right into it. Oh, I was hauling hay all day, and I I looked in the back right corner and there was four does out. And uh I was either like, well, I'll either haul one more load or I'll go sit 15 minutes before dark. Went and sat 15 minutes before dark, played one game on my phone, looked up, he I took a doe bleed and he jumped the fence. Slammed him right there. With dad's old three. Yep. But like it's but it's stuff like that. Just it can happen so fast. It's the same as when we'll get to this. It's it's quite a way how it ended.

SPEAKER_00: 11:04

But so how many deer have you shot now?

SPEAKER_04: 11:06

Uh five and this is my five and this is my fifth in a row.

SPEAKER_00: 11:10

Your fifth in a row? Yeah. Five years in a row.

SPEAKER_04: 11:12

Yeah, getting on a getting on a streak. But I think I think and the funny part is every single deer till this deer has been bigger than the last. And so I'm I am gonna boost. Yeah, I dare say the old uh the old Matthews is gonna have to make an appearance for next season to try to get one down with the bow.

SPEAKER_03: 11:28

Yep.

SPEAKER_04: 11:29

But uh but yeah, so I started with that. But as I was saying, there was there's a lot of deer up and down this valley, and I guess my first real encounter with this deer after going back through pictures, and it only clued into me like last week, was in 2022 in August. I had a couple pictures of this guy coming through a trail that I mainly used to get back into a duck pond, and I had a camera set up on it just because it's at one of those spots, it's kind of a narrow point of my woods top to bottom, so it works kind of as a pinch point if deer want to travel through the woods, and I had that camera up there, and uh and I was not hunting this deer at the time, and he would have been what we kind of between me and the neighbors and just history of the deer in general in the area, we figure the one I harvested this year was about eight and a half.

SPEAKER_03: 12:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 12:12

So that's yeah. Three seasons ago, he was six and a half. So basically hitting a good prime, but he didn't have much mass to him. But the time length was just it popped. But the funny part was when I opened that picture and realized it wasn't the same deer I was hunting, I didn't even think twice about him.

SPEAKER_01: 12:27

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_04: 12:27

Yeah, and at this point, like I hadn't even shot anything over a hundred and ten inches.

SPEAKER_01: 12:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 12:32

And like I didn't but I didn't have a thought shame in that. I didn't have a thought. No, I'd shoot, like, one walks out with a bow, it's just whatever gets you going. I just like standing around the table with my friends and sharing a story.

SPEAKER_01: 12:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 12:41

That's the best part about the whole thing.

SPEAKER_01: 12:43

But anyway. Hence where we are tonight.

SPEAKER_04: 12:46

Yeah, exactly. Um sorry, Logan. Yeah, now I'm paused.

SPEAKER_01: 12:51

No, so you you're looking at you got pictures of that deer.

SPEAKER_04: 12:53

I got picture of yeah, I got a picture of this deer. I'm sitting beside here now. And uh and I just yeah, I had pictures of him, but I had pictures of another one I was hunting. I already had him for two years. And uh my neighbor ended up harvesting my th I can't, and I'm I'm sorry if he's listening, I get this wrong, but he was he was 170s.

SPEAKER_01: 13:10

Was he?

SPEAKER_04: 13:10

He was a large, large white tail, had a lot of history between him and me.

SPEAKER_01: 13:15

We both had him for that's not the one he got uh because he was on the podcast.

SPEAKER_04: 13:19

He got that in twenty-three that year.

SPEAKER_01: 13:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_04: 13:23

Yeah, twenty yeah, twenty three. He twenty three, he got that deer. Yeah, twenty-three. Mm-hmm. In uh bow season he actually ended up harvesting that deer. And he went went 170s, and so I was kind of naturally your gut hit your gut hits the floor when you hear that. Yeah, like my first big deer I actually worked in and tried to hunt, and there was some nights like I went back to a camera a few days later at that time, and like I would um he came in like 15 minutes right underneath my stand after dark. Like yeah, I was close to him, it just it never it never lined up for me, and then he got harvested, and then I was like, well, what's next? And at the time of when I was hunting this deer, I had him on a rope so good, thought I had a really good chance at him. But like I said, the farm's narrow, which makes it really tough to hunt when he cruises a dough. Because he could I could literally sit be driving down the field my truck and I could wash him chase a dough and cross my whole property.

SPEAKER_01: 14:12

Just got to put your sheep fences higher.

SPEAKER_04: 14:13

Yeah, I guess so. But that's just the width and how that property works. The the woods kind of snakes through, and I have a jot out on my east side of the woods where I end up getting him, which makes it a little wider after my grandfather passed away. We picked up that wood blot.

SPEAKER_00: 14:26

I suppose that means it's not good for holding gear, but do you do you think it's better for I have great traffic? Yeah, you've got a good traffic corridor, like a long near.

SPEAKER_04: 14:35

This year in general for bucks was actually slower. And where I'm at, it's weird. Everything around me has a lot of does, but I know every single doe that I see every single day.

SPEAKER_00: 14:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 14:44

Like I know that doe. If I if she's gone for like three or four days, I'm assuming that especially this time of year, I'm assuming she's locked down. And I had a uh right before I shot him. The day before I shot him, I saw three new different bucks come through on trail camera. I saw two of them in person hunting that evening.

SPEAKER_01: 15:03

It must be easier to set up trail cameras where it is narrow. You've got the deer trails probably picked out pretty good.

SPEAKER_04: 15:08

I can, yeah, I can pinch point deer and like because there's fields on both sides, my wood stretch is long, but to even get in my back portion of woods, the to the they have to kind of follow lower in the valley and then go up high to stay in the woods. So where it narrows in low to get up through, that's where I kind of have created a pinch point and where I found a lot of these deer. But as far as like I have two different food plots, one of my, because my farm, the fields stretch farther back on the west side and they're near shorter on the east side, and then turns into woods. So I have two flu uh two food plots set up in there that and I've still never shot a deer over a plot or bait. No. Ever. What are you putting in for plots? Uh this fall was it was just I actually got it from just a local co-op, just a farm store, and it was just I ended up putting in kind of late because we had such a dry summer.

SPEAKER_01: 15:56

I like their blood. Yeah, I know mine.

SPEAKER_04: 15:57

Yeah, we just had such a dry summer, it was tough, so I actually went and grabbed some really good decomposted sheep manure. Oh, okay. And I put like I put like four loads and a half acre and basically just planted straight manure, and it was it's it was still held moisture in the bottom, so it actually came up with the biggest. Oh, yeah, sheep manure. Yeah. I mean, I had some bucks passing through there, but I nothing nothing too exciting, but good travel, and my does were using it lots. And at some point when a doe gets in heat, especially with the amount of does I have on that property, like buck comes cruise and locks her down, I bit I have a really good shot at getting a shot out of them from there at the right place, right time.

SPEAKER_03: 16:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 16:32

Just because my property is a really good spot for a a buck to lock down a doe in those little small grass patch areas, little cut corner areas. It's it's good, it's good woods for that, but as far as keeping a deer, it's very tricky. A little tougher.

SPEAKER_01: 16:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 16:46

Yeah, because the stretch of that valley from top to bottom till you get to the next road is only from very bottom to very top where it wise at a road, it's probably only four and a half, five kilometers.

SPEAKER_01: 16:57

Yep.

SPEAKER_04: 16:58

So for a deer to travel, that's nothing.

SPEAKER_01: 17:01

No, all no.

SPEAKER_04: 17:01

No, like a deer to travel, that's nothing. But uh but then anyway, we got into I ended up harvesting uh uh ten point that gave me a good opportunity there late that season in 23, because after after um the buck I I called him fingers just because the first time I saw him, I just the only thing I saw like his rack just looked like a palm of hand. He was a perfect ten.

SPEAKER_01: 17:21

Oh, I've never seen pictures he's showing up.

SPEAKER_04: 17:23

Yeah, he just looked like a I never thought I was gonna see a bigger deer in my life. Like I didn't at that point when I got a first picture of that, I never had anything over a nine point. Yeah. And then and then it was just a perfect picture broadside of him just staring dead at the camera. Big old behemoth. I never thought I'd see a bigger deer my entire life.

SPEAKER_03: 17:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 17:39

And I'm like, well, geez, and that and that I think that first picture I can still picture it in my mind right now. I think that's when I knew I really wanted to hunt.

SPEAKER_01: 17:47

Uh maybe I should hunt harder, because this is around here in the realm of the city.

SPEAKER_04: 17:50

And even when I was when I was a kid, dad hunt him when I grew up, but his walks in the woods were just turned into walks in the woods with a gun. I used to go sit with him when I was a kid, and dad's harvested a couple good deer. Like there's a neat, yeah. Yeah, like which I believe, if I look at I looked at the rack even the night before I came, like I believe those genes from that deer are the same as what's in my deer. And he shot that deer in eighty-eight.

SPEAKER_01: 18:11

Wow. None of us.

SPEAKER_04: 18:13

And if you if you went as a flo uh as a crow flies from where this deer died, it's 250 yards.

SPEAKER_01: 18:18

Oh, really? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 18:19

250 yards from where this deer died would have been where dad died. But all the characteristics are the same in any way. So that that bloodline, even the bloodline from um the deer my neighbor shot in the 170s, it was so obvious. Like the frame of it, everything about it, like the brow tines, the frame, the stickers, the kicks, like they were all and then your neighbor also a little further up starts with an R he he got one in that valley, I think, in 2017, maybe, and that thing was huge too.

SPEAKER_01: 18:47

Oh, yeah, there's there's been some it's crazy what it produces in there. Yeah, and I think it's because like I said, everyone they could hide well, they've got great food, and everyone's on the same page of like let it go, let it grow, and then it produces.

SPEAKER_04: 18:59

And that's the thing, like in the end this woods, it's not there's no access to it from the road or anything. Like you just it it's just so hard to access it. We even to get this bucket, you can any of my friends that know, like we had seven of us down there with uh one of the game sleds. We had seven of us and we did not have fun. No, we did not have a lot of fun. There was a lot of breaks for seven guys for uh here that a couple of them smokers. Yeah, it was for probably like a hair hair shy of 300 pound on the hoof.

SPEAKER_01: 19:26

Yeah. So it was And I and you were laying on it.

SPEAKER_04: 19:29

Yeah, I showed you. Well the thing is they all they all showed up in hauling clothes. I was in minus up to minus five hunting clothes to walk out of there that evening.

SPEAKER_01: 19:40

Yeah, a bit warm.

SPEAKER_04: 19:41

I was a little sweaty and I shot him very early.

SPEAKER_01: 19:43

Yes, yeah, you're lucky about that too, long before.

SPEAKER_04: 19:45

Yeah, we'll get yeah, but anyway, so 23 and then 22 or 23 I harvested that 10 point just because he uh I didn't even remember that this other buck was alive because I was so just think kept thinking about fingers and how could I have done something different and blah blah blah, and what do I do next? And this 10 point showed up and he gave me a good shot there and yeah, took him. And then the next year in 24 uh was the first time I really started to have action with this deer, and then I realized it was it was him and uh I hunted my What was his nickname?

SPEAKER_01: 20:18

Toes.

SPEAKER_04: 20:19

I called him Ian.

SPEAKER_01: 20:20

Ian Ian. That's cool. There's some guy Ian thinking like that.

SPEAKER_04: 20:23

Is that from open season? That's from open season. Yeah, you got it. That big giant deer in open season, that's where I that's where I got it from. But uh yeah, so anyway.

SPEAKER_01: 20:31

Oh yeah, Patrick Wahlberg plays his voice. I just remember that for some reason. That is random. Well, he's got a very unique voice for an actor. Big open season fans. Okay, guys. Yeah, we're waiting. Okay. I can't do it. I'm not gonna try to do it on the mic makes it sound funny. But yeah, okay, Ian. All right, good. So Ian.

SPEAKER_04: 20:49

And he the first time he really gave me a good, good look at him, I I actually just uh go have I have an old neighbor up the road I visit and have tea with and just chat and shoot the shit. And anyway, so I I got done hunting that night in in my east side food plot, and uh I got home, just got done, and he called me because he knew he always waits after dark and he knows I'm hunting. So I zipped up there and I was chatting with him. And basically as soon as I sat down, got my boots off, I had a I did have a cell camera at that plot that year, and uh send me some pictures and I'd send me a side view picture that was kind of blurry. I'm like, oh geez, that's a nice buck. And then the section picture, he was just coming into full frame and looking dead at the camera, and I went, that's that's bigger. I'm like, that's that's even bigger than fingers was, and I'm like, holy crap, what do I do here? Yeah. And then anyway, that's the last picture I got of him for it, just like a ghost, just came the same thing the the year before, just came in and left in August. But this this was inside.

SPEAKER_01: 21:45

But your neighbors he he had a lot of history with him.

SPEAKER_04: 21:48

I mean yeah, like he said he I think he had him a lot steadier up there, and it's a longer stretch of woodland, like the whole the entire because we're on the west of me, my west tree line's all woods. Yeah, and there'd be a good probably if I had to guess a good 220, 40 acre block of woods on the direct west of me.

SPEAKER_01: 22:07

That's a lot of area. Did your neighbor uh I don't know if he wants to be named on this, but he's been on here before. Anyways, that's the big buck hunter. Did he have sheds from him? Because I know he's he's a big shed hunter. Did he have sheds from this deer?

SPEAKER_04: 22:20

Found left side last year.

SPEAKER_01: 22:21

Oh, you did? Okay. He's also an accomplished hunter.

SPEAKER_04: 22:28

There they walk. Oh, he shoots shoots absolute beautiful deer.

SPEAKER_01: 22:31

Has been on here too.

SPEAKER_04: 22:32

No, they found the because I went searching for that shed for till now tomorrow because he hung on to his right side forever. Because he found the left side up way west of the farm, and I had a picture of him coming from the east into that same food plot in Jane January twenty-third.

SPEAKER_01: 22:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_04: 22:52

With his with his right side? With his right side. Huh. And that's a bit late. And the and the left side was found about a kilometer west.

SPEAKER_02: 23:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 23:00

So he came down in, did a loop, and then came out to the east. So he held that right antler forever.

SPEAKER_01: 23:04

Yeah. Huh.

SPEAKER_04: 23:06

Yeah, which I found kind of wild that he held. Yeah, I thought I was gonna find that thing because see a deer with the left side dropped and it just fresh snowed. I left work early and I went with a flashlight in the freaking dark in January, looking for that shed for like four kilometers on his tracks.

SPEAKER_01: 23:19

Really?

SPEAKER_04: 23:19

Yeah, yeah. I was in the dark for like two, three hours just with a flashlight just following deer tracks. Scared shitless, but I wanted that shed. Yeah, bears were hibernating, I didn't care.

SPEAKER_00: 23:28

Yeah. So was this a deer that summered in your area, do you figure? I don't know.

SPEAKER_04: 23:32

Actually, well, when I I'm getting to it here, I I had uh before I had fingers before, he was my summer deer. I had him on a rope. I could basically I could basically look at my watch and tell him when he was going to come through in summer.

SPEAKER_01: 23:44

In summer.

SPEAKER_04: 23:44

All the way through to like bow season, and bow season, like then he disappeared bow every single year. He just moved on. And that's the tough part about that piece of land is I like hunting my own land because I like the fact that like we've been there six generations, or something, like just even the fact I'm lucky enough to have something like this. Yeah, because a lot of people living there to have this size of a deer, New Brunswick caliber deer. It's good caliber deer.

SPEAKER_01: 24:08

You appreciate that, that you recognize.

SPEAKER_04: 24:09

Yeah, like I I mean I could I could go hunt on land and I'd still probably get the same rush at shooting deer, but I just like the fact that just back of the farm. That's my favorite answer when people ask me, Oh, where'd you shoot him? Where'd you shoot him? Back of the farm.

SPEAKER_01: 24:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 24:22

That's all I say. Or in the lungs. That's my other favorite. That's my other favorite answer. Where'd you shoot him? In the lungs, obviously.

SPEAKER_01: 24:27

Yeah. But uh in the deadly spot.

SPEAKER_04: 24:30

But the season of twenty-three, um, I was actually getting very frustrated that season because I had a great summer.

SPEAKER_02: 24:36

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_04: 24:37

Good action all summer. And then with deer. Yeah. Deer in general, just through plots and pictures and summer scouting. Like it was a phenomenal summer for me. Probably the one of the best ever had. Starting to get in, really getting to know like betting areas and the movement of the does and where stuff's coming and going. And then season started, and I've never had a worse season start. Just I didn't like I think I hunted my first oh, I don't even know, maybe 12 hunts and didn't see a deer.

SPEAKER_01: 25:04

Really?

SPEAKER_04: 25:04

Yeah. Wow. Didn't see a deer. Like all bow season, barely and rifle, and I was getting and I was watching that plot a lot on the east and some in the I was hunting, some in the west with the bird. Yeah, it's and that's the thing about down in that valley. Like the first season I really started hunting, it was tough because like my buddies didn't want to spot with the good doe. I'm like, geez, if I could watch does, I could sit here all day. Yeah. I went like 18 days and saw two deer.

SPEAKER_01: 25:26

That's crazy. Yeah, that gets discouraging. But I mean, we had another friend of guests this season, Dalton. He sat a week, he saw what, one doe or no deer?

SPEAKER_04: 25:34

I think it was I think it was two deer, and the second one was the Bucky Shaw.

SPEAKER_01: 25:39

Yeah, he shot this ten point, and it's like, yeah, that's all he saw though. That's how it goes.

SPEAKER_04: 25:42

Yeah. And that was deer he's after for years.

SPEAKER_01: 25:44

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 25:44

It's crazy. And then it just happens like that, just go sit and it only takes one deer. Yeah, that's the thing. And then so I was getting really frustrated. And uh where I had fingers locked down a lot, I never really decided to hunt in there till then because it was so awful to get in there. Like it's the side of like an old cut that's on the side of the property that goes around the corner, and it's just there's just no good way to get in there. Like you were just walking through a bedding area, walking through a travel area, like there was just no good way to get in there. My perfect wind's north northeast down there, which just blows straight up towards basically back to my house, straight up the field where there's really nothing.

SPEAKER_03: 26:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_04: 26:23

And uh, which is usually actually a predominant wind in there is where I set up that stand originally, but I was getting so frustrated there was one day on the season of 24, well, which we talked about in the podcast last year of the three bucks. Yes, you mean Ryan. Where I where I was getting so frustrated and seeing nothing. I middle of the day at one o'clock in the afternoon. I don't I've seen these same two does in one fawn for a week straight. Only deer I saw. I said, screw it, I'm gonna take a walk down around that corner to where I had fingers a lot and a lot of good bucks coming through, just wasn't a easy spot to hunt. I thought I could get them 200 yards on that trail on my travel point. Nothing. Anyway, I walked a hundred yards and one in the afternoon I spooked to 7.5 does.

SPEAKER_03: 27:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 27:01

More deer than I saw in three weeks. One in the afternoon I walked 200 yards sitting. 200 yards from where I was looking.

SPEAKER_02: 27:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 27:07

Walked around the corner, scrapes, rubs, trails. Like it was a zoo. Yeah. It looked like the sheep trails going back out of the barn to the pastures, like just lines. I'm like, holy, ran across my stand, ran across, grabbed my uh one of my bow, early season bow stands I had set up, ran back over, put it up, and then that was at 3 30 in the afternoon, and went home and hind the next morning, and then my nine point last year ran out that first morning after seeing nothing, that got my blood going so friggin' bad, and it was a it was a nice nine point.

SPEAKER_02: 27:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 27:37

Still, still yet my biggest deer again. And I I hammered him. And that was that for that yeah, yeah. But then so I shot that deer November the 10th, not as patriotic as Caleb, sadly, but the 10th. I was a little we all can't be. I was a little frisky when he when he came out because it was the that was the most rut action I've ever got to watch to got to watch, because uh does are coming out and there's a seven-point just dogging him, and then he came out with his head straight on a doe's ankles, and that's when I took the nine. But I had set up a I had set up a camera in there Um when I found all the rubs and stuff while I moved my stand.

SPEAKER_03: 28:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 28:12

Just to see if I could get a picture naturally, just to get to see if I what was actually moving down there. And uh but I shot the deer the next morning. I never touched that camera for a month and a half. Oh, really? Until mid-December when got that camera mid-December, it might have even been after Christmas, somewhere around then. The buck I shot this year was on a rope. Four days after I shot my deer, 9 30 in the morning, 30 yards of my stand.

SPEAKER_00: 28:36

Really?

SPEAKER_04: 28:36

Four days, and god and God knows how many times he was through that plot, right? Yeah. Like where I shot this deer this year, where I put my camera, was pretty similar to the same spot. I had a lot of action last year. It was like four trees up. Yeah. I had one picture in a month and a half of a deer. One picture in a month and a half. I watched dozens of deer this season go in through that. Yeah. Well, not dozens, but like I saw a deer steadily, right? But never a picture. They just never touched touch the camera, right?

SPEAKER_01: 29:04

So like sometimes you just gotta that's camera. They're tools, right? It's like a GPS. GPS can work, but you've got to like kind of do, right?

SPEAKER_04: 29:11

Your gun's a tool, your binocer a tool, your grunt calls a tool, your stands a tool, like it's just like you have to put wow. You just you just have to put all your matter of getting all the tools together at one point and everything lining up, which I got in the way when we get to it, I it was a lucky, but anyway. I had him so much, and like the most my some of my favorite trail camera pictures I've ever got off this deer, and just every single picture I had of them. I didn't have a nighttime picture of him. No. Couldn't get one if I tried.

SPEAKER_01: 29:40

Oh yeah. Yeah, just a daytime picture all the way through like late November, early December, right into January until he shed that shed, and then like wondering uh not cut you off here in New Brunswick, our deer season ends pretty near the end all almost the end of November.

SPEAKER_04: 29:56

Yeah, it's basically the uh usually we're The twenty third. End of the third, third week, fourth week, whatever it works out to be. Yeah, this year it's twenty third, in case some were wondering. Yeah, last year might have been twenty second. So either way, like and I shot that deer the tenth.

unknown: 30:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 30:13

He showed up like he was there like fifteenth to fifteenth.

SPEAKER_01: 30:15

Because our rut really seems to kick off almost when D. Remember. Remembrance Day Week.

SPEAKER_04: 30:22

That's a really good time. I find it's Remembrance Day Week. Like Remembrance Day Week's usually a lockdown week. Like I didn't see a deer for five days.

SPEAKER_02: 30:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 30:28

And I was seeing bucks and deer, and actually I probably saw more. I definitely saw more, way more bucks this season than the other season. Actually, passed a I passed a decent eight point early and like a nice seven. And then I saw my fours and my fives that I just basically called them by name when they walked out. Yeah. But uh but yeah, so I had that deer just steady and steady, and I'm like, I want this deer bad.

SPEAKER_01: 30:49

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 30:50

Especially too, because I was I was on I had a monkey on my back from that from the last one, and congress to my neighbor on that deer, because that that thing was stellar. Yeah. Like what a what a white tail. And um and so now we're into 25 and I got some big thoughts about what to do for this deer, and I just didn't know how to But you're you you weren't shooting anything else for twenty this year, 2025. You wanted after him. I would have been tempted enough.

SPEAKER_01: 31:17

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 31:18

But but the thing is, like, I and I had a good summer again. Well, I didn't even have like I don't know, the summer was busy, like with my work, we picked up that what we just talked about, hay gear. And my summer got really busy this summer, and I didn't have the time to put in that I normally actually would put in. End up only putting in one food food plot kind of late. I just did that six-week turnaround, like brassica kale mix in the corner in the middle.

SPEAKER_01: 31:42

I find that their mixes are really good.

SPEAKER_04: 31:45

Yeah, like they actually it's not like a bought-in mix. Like they make their own out of their own different seed and actually.

SPEAKER_01: 31:49

They have like the Hunter's brassica blend and all the things.

SPEAKER_04: 31:51

Hunter's Brassica blend, Hunter's dessert blend, summer blend. Oh yeah. Like they actually do a really good thing.

SPEAKER_01: 31:55

I think it's better than the current Canadian uh food plot seller kind of thing. I I find I like better luck.

SPEAKER_04: 32:03

Well, like a bag bag, like a bag store stuff.

SPEAKER_01: 32:06

Yeah. Yeah. I've had better luck with the like the custom made local feed store stuff than I have the brand. It's good in the price of it, too.

SPEAKER_04: 32:13

Like you can get like it's a kg bag, depending on what it is. Obviously, some seeds are going to be more expensive than other, but I think I could bought I think I bought four kgs for forty bucks. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 32:22

Like why that's really good.

SPEAKER_04: 32:23

I spent forty bucks a lot faster in hunting season than doing a whole food plot. Yeah. Right. I got the tractors and gear at home, which I'm fortunate to have, like, because I just grew up fortunate enough to grow up with that.

SPEAKER_01: 32:32

That does help. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 32:33

Yeah, it was kind of nice. Even though I actually I took the disc back and it was so dry this summer, I didn't I did like I drove over it and I'm like, this is just gonna get four inches, this is gonna get four inches of manure. I'm gonna sprinkle on top and I'm gonna roll it into the manure because that's the only way this will grow. Yeah, and it grew okay. It didn't grow great, but it was enough like a month and a half. And I I did I did throw some apples and stuff there just for the more or less for doughs and stuff. But yeah. But half the time they're in there, half time they're touching apples, half time they're grazing. Yeah. And then uh even when there wasn't stuff there, the deer were still coming through and grazing on the food plot. So they did like it. I was quite impressed by it. I'll probably use it again.

SPEAKER_00: 33:07

So did you have him in your food plots any?

SPEAKER_04: 33:10

Nope.

SPEAKER_00: 33:10

Nope.

SPEAKER_04: 33:10

Nope. I watched him watched him through uh most of August and early September from the other side of the valley, looking down in, and you'd never see him, but I'd uh the first time I saw him, I got lucky because I just you look from the road and it's a long field and there's kind of some little brooks going through, but it then turns into marsh grass. And it is tall marsh grass, and there's acres and acres of it. But I actually I re I saw a picture later on that we found out. Um if you go to the bottom of my road, it has a hard cutback, and there was a random neighbor driving by that sent a picture to my buddy of this deer, and it was that deer.

SPEAKER_00: 33:44

Oh really?

SPEAKER_04: 33:45

And it was in like early June, and his spread was probably uh I don't know, his antlers were probably already like 17, 18 inches wide. By then. In early June. Yeah. Like he was and just huge bases, like his brows were already coming up, huge bases, and his it was just starting to come around.

SPEAKER_01: 34:03

Definitely noticeable deer when you're trying to get around. In early June.

SPEAKER_04: 34:06

Yeah, in early June, when you might like when half the deer you wouldn't even know if they were a buck or a dough yet. He was he was he was out to his ears or past in very early June. And uh but that was right at the top of my road, which as again, as a crow flies, is not that far. But I didn't and I never thought my bucks went up. Like we always tried to figure out where they went. Me and a couple neighbors, like we've sat down, we've talked about like where do these where are these guys going? Like, where are they wintering? Where are they going? This is the only buck of that I've actually been able to follow in winter.

SPEAKER_02: 34:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 34:32

Because like winter, there's no deer down there. They don't winter down there. But anyway, this one did this, this guy did this winter. If just maybe he's getting old, his range was getting a little smaller, or what or what could have it. But either way, in in June he was way up at the top, which would be a good couple kilometers from where point A to B where I shot him versus where LC all run around and went. God, God knows. But um, but anyway, I got to watch him in summer quite a bit. I'd just go for a lead evening drive, and then I'd always find him with another. And I don't know where this other buck went, but like the first time I saw him, I just I was looking at the fields and I stopped, had the binos out, and I was looking out the window, and uh I didn't see anything in the field, and then right when I turned almost right when I was taking my binoculars down, I noticed a deer in the long grass, the head came up and I was like, oh geez, that's a buck. And it was a good buck, like it was like it was an eight or a ten, like it was noticeable, and I'm a kilometer and a half away. Yeah. Just in like whatever by 40 by nose, 12 by 40 or 10 by 40, maybe I can't remember now. And uh, but I could see him clearing that, and then I saw a second deer walking behind him, and the head came up. That was noticeable. And then all all I thought in my head, I'm like, well, there he is, and then got the shakes in by no, watching him from a kilometer and a half in August. But just it's just a matter that I got to finally lay my eyes on one of these deers, just just to like, yeah, let's go. Yeah, then anyway, so I I took that lap a lot. Watched him quite a few times in that season. Did you? Yeah. Yeah, and then then when September changed, he seemed to change and there wasn't as many. He wasn't I don't know. I went for a lot of drives and didn't see him. I was just trying to get my eyes on him again. Um I actually did see him from my side of the farm once in July when I was haying. I saw him way down the corner, just run across. Big buck, and I just there's no other buck like that. Yeah. See when you see him, it's just like that's him. Yeah. There's just no other that really matches to it. And then he goes to me. Just disappeared.

SPEAKER_01: 36:26

As they do.

SPEAKER_04: 36:27

As they do. Yeah, that's the thing, narrow property. Like, and I and like I feel like if there's if there's deer on my property, I feel like I'd have cameras in good enough places to figure out where they are.

SPEAKER_00: 36:39

Are you doing anything to conceal your your cameras or like like are you putting them high up in the air or you're worried the bucks see them? Yeah, like some deer get cameras shy. You find I don't find it.

SPEAKER_04: 36:50

I swear to God, this deer, I'm pretty sure this deer knows the cameras are there, and I'm pretty sure he poses for them.

SPEAKER_01: 36:56

I swear to god, like the pictures, some of the pictures I've got deer that they I know they spot them.

SPEAKER_04: 37:00

Yeah, but like some of the pic like the pictures I had of fingers, like it looked like he was posing for a magazine cover. Like just perfect, perfect photos of this deer. I don't do really much. It depends. Like if I'm in a spot like down and like near that cup with long grass, I'll put my camera pie or facing down, so I get less pictures of freaking grass, so I'm not sitting there scrolling through God knows how many photos, because that's happened before, but like kind of depends where I am, I guess. Like if it's in a secluded spot on a little game trail, it's kind of hard if you're in a tight game trail, so I just leave them for it.

SPEAKER_01: 37:28

I do try to put my cameras though up facing down, but that's more for bear.

SPEAKER_04: 37:33

I just got the bear boxes for that.

SPEAKER_01: 37:34

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00: 37:35

I I have watched deer avoid cameras. Have you? I don't know if it was intentionally or not.

SPEAKER_01: 37:39

Or I've seemed to avoid them too, but I don't think it's intentional.

SPEAKER_00: 37:42

He might have, but he did it.

SPEAKER_04: 37:43

He did a damn good job for this year. Maybe, maybe he did. Yeah. I don't know. It's possible that he could have been avoiding cameras because like the pictures I had this season versus what I was seeing was early.

SPEAKER_01: 37:52

I was watching this this clip with Don Higgins, and uh who's a well-known buck hunter out of the States, and he was saying that he had a camera on one side of the tree. One buck. He had a camera on the same tree on the other side. I think he had like fifteen pictures of different bucks in the summer. Like it's just camera placement, you know.

SPEAKER_00: 38:11

Yeah, you think you know what's out there, but m really you're just seeing a small portion of what's walking by.

SPEAKER_04: 38:16

Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's the thing. Like I watched deer walk within 15 yards of my camera. I shot my I shot my deer 80 yards of my camera, never had a picture of him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 38:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 38:24

I spooked a I spooked a deer going in there. 30 yards from them. I got a picture of them.

SPEAKER_01: 38:28

See? Yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_04: 38:31

Again, it's this season, we get through bow season, and like I I don't know. I and like I don't know what it was with this fall, but like we had a super dry summer and it was getting a real wet fall, so like it was raining a lot, and I don't know I don't have any covered stands at all.

SPEAKER_01: 38:45

Might want to invest in that.

SPEAKER_04: 38:46

Not friggin' one. So anyway, I got wet a lot and I was starting to get pretty miserable, and that deer wasn't showing himself, and even like not even like a good 120, 30 inch, 10 point was showing himself. There's just not much. Like I saw an eight point and a seven point, yeah. Good, good deer that were up and comers, but there wasn't a I never had the thought of a trigger pull on my mind at any any point in the season at all. Yeah. But enjoying watching deer, enjoying still just getting out hunting because that's that's half of just nothing like sitting there and sitting there in the morning just watching the world wake up. Yeah, there was a couple days I was sitting there like I was in the stand like an hour before light on the rain days. I'd like to go down in that stand in the cup because I could actually get down in there quiet on the rain days. Oh, yeah. But it's also a way longer walk. So you get pretty wet. So I'm just standing there under a tree in the dark for an hour like, what am I doing?

SPEAKER_01: 39:34

Contemplating everything.

SPEAKER_04: 39:35

Yeah, just for the hope, because like I knew he was around. Like I knew he was around. Like a deer like that does not go unheard of if it gets shot. So like I knew he was a I knew he was gonna be around somewhere in that valley.

SPEAKER_01: 39:47

Well, wasn't it one of your neighbors every time they heard a gunshot in the valley, they'd like you guys message each other. Like, was that? We mess each other a lot, too.

SPEAKER_04: 39:54

Yeah, well, even just intrigued, like, because like wow, like been best friends since I was two. It's just like do you shoot some, you shoot some.

SPEAKER_01: 39:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 39:59

And two, like we have we have an insane amount of hunting pressure.

SPEAKER_01: 40:03

Oh yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 40:04

Like we have an absolutely insane amount of hunting pressure, so we're interested to see what's getting going on in the area. Like 'cause like I try to watch fields because I try to get like there's like there's notes written on vehicles this year for guys to leave places, and like there was a lot of that going on around. So like even both of us, we were trying to figure out who was shooting what and where. Yeah. And legally, someone that we know, like, because we both we know everyone that actually hunts in that valley.

SPEAKER_01: 40:29

Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 40:30

Any other gunshot that's well, it's all privately. Yeah, like we know everyone that hunts. So like if if a gunshot goes off that we hear, there's a pretty good chance we know it, or it's somebody shooting something off the side of the road.

SPEAKER_02: 40:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 40:39

And if we don't know it or see like a post later that night that that person shot deer in that direction, something doesn't make sense, or someone just shot off the road, or which I mean, yeah, there's and there's not no, no, there's not really there's no crown land on those fields. So it's like it's either people just jumping, yeah, there's just jumping onto farmers' fields and shooting deer, which happens way too much. Oh, yeah. Like I spend a lot of time in dire deer season driving around. Kicking drinking parents. Yeah, my my properties, my neighbors' properties.

SPEAKER_01: 41:06

Like, yeah, I could I could go ruin deer season for me in a way because that's what you're doing.

SPEAKER_04: 41:11

I can I can go around a 15 kilometer block and I can name every single one of my neighbors and I can tell you what properties they own and where. And who's allowed to hunt there? Yeah. Like you just know. Yeah. Like you know if they're hunters, if they don't have to be a good one. Yeah, exactly. Like, yeah, like a good my well, Lane, who's been on the podcast for his mother-in-law, owns the property that goes right to my road.

SPEAKER_01: 41:29

She's had trouble with the process.

SPEAKER_04: 41:30

Yeah, she's had trouble in the past. Like we were watching, there was a guy on a field that's up on my road that I I actually do the I'm forging the hay off that now, and he's been in and out of there. Like and anyway, got that dealt with. That's a different story for a different time.

SPEAKER_01: 41:44

We'll talk about trespassing something.

SPEAKER_04: 41:46

But either way, that that value is a lot of hunting pressure, but I knew he was going to be in there somewhere. Yeah. So I was just hanging tight, trying to be as smart as I could without sitting too much. Like if it was a if it's just a bad wind, I'd just stay home, even though I will like I love going hunting. Like, I don't have to shoot something to love going hunting. So I like being out there, so it disappoints me when I don't get to go. And I like there was two weeks straight I had the worst wind I could ever have, southwest. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 42:08

Should you pay attention to that? What's good? I just like that's a little windy. I'm going hunting.

SPEAKER_04: 42:13

Yeah, like if it was too windy, like I went on I went on basically every rain day I could. Yeah. Went on every drain day I could, because that's when I could get in there the quietest.

SPEAKER_02: 42:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 42:20

Sent travels the least, and I'd still kind of watch my if it was south or southwest or west. Like I can hunt a west. I don't like to hunt a west. I will hunt a west, depending where. And if not, I'd just go sit at my grove and just watch deer. Yeah. Because west wind doesn't really bother me there because it's quite a ways away, and like I'm kind of out in a grove of trees, it's just been randomly in my field since I was born. Don't know why it's there still. Just a clump of trees in the middle of my field. They'd be like a quarter of an acre.

SPEAKER_01: 42:43

So I just sit, I just pay attention when you're running the tractor.

SPEAKER_04: 42:45

I just sit at the tip of that and just watch deer. And I just I enjoy that enough in itself. Yeah. But um, but then I got to uh this past Wednesday, the day after, the day after Remembrance Day. Still couldn't get the patriotic deer, but no. Anyway, I'm time. Maybe next year. I'm not gonna put him back. So um anyway, we got to Wednesday and I got a call from my taxidermist, Godfrey.

SPEAKER_03: 43:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 43:09

Got my deer done from last year. Cool. Went up and saw Godfrey, chatted with him, shot the shit. He shot it, he shot a nice nine point with his bow early season because well, as Dac Mars only gets so much time and he still loves hunting too. So he's shot a nice point. Yeah, exactly. So anyway, he uh he was talking to me and just shooting the shit for a while, grabbed my mount, was leaving, and he's like, You've been seeing anything there. I was like, Well, this mall should have been after a couple years, but he's he's been around, but he's just not hasn't showed himself yet. He's like, Oh well, good luck. I'm like, Yeah, I'll send you a picture of him tomorrow. Which is Thursday. Yeah, which is the day I shot my deer.

SPEAKER_01: 43:42

You sent him a picture.

SPEAKER_04: 43:43

So anyway, and then I was like, I haven't really seen him much, and anyway, so I went I left there at noon. I guess I worked the rest day, kind of worked a little late, and I got a couple groceries after work and just got out there and what'd you get?

SPEAKER_01: 43:55

Oreos.

SPEAKER_04: 43:56

Uh milk.

SPEAKER_01: 43:58

Milk and Oreos. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 43:59

Top of milk. Yeah. Dog eye do, I always support your local dairy farmer. Northumberland, baby. Yep. Um sorry. Anyway, I was relevant. Anyway, I was I was leaving Sussex and I scrolled my phone.

SPEAKER_01: 44:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 44:11

And uh and right in the field edge where I do have a tacticam was him. Shout out. Yeah, and then there was no other pictures anywhere else of them.

SPEAKER_01: 44:21

You did have you had a picture of the buck that day.

SPEAKER_04: 44:23

Yep.

SPEAKER_01: 44:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 44:24

That night.

SPEAKER_01: 44:24

That night, okay.

SPEAKER_04: 44:25

He came he came through scrolling the plot and had a picture of him there. That was the only picture I had him like in season yet.

SPEAKER_01: 44:33

But did your heart like jump a little? Like, holy shit. I just saw him.

SPEAKER_04: 44:38

I literally just the I exited out that I exited out that app, and that was a really cold day. Like that was a really like we just came off a rainy stretch, like uh Wednesday. No, Tuesday was 15 degrees.

unknown: 44:49

And right.

SPEAKER_01: 44:49

For our American listeners, do you know 15 degrees Celsius?

SPEAKER_04: 44:54

It's hot.

SPEAKER_01: 44:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 44:55

You wear early season clothes, yeah, and you can wear like it is warm. And then it goes to and then went to minus six. Feels like minus eight Wednesday. And then I had I worked Wednesday that week only. So I had Thursday to Tuesday off, which was a great way to get it cold. Yeah, either way I didn't care. And anyway, I got a picture on Wednesday night. And then if I exit out the app, check the weather for the morning. Northeast wind. First one I'd seen in three weeks. I'm like, go time.

SPEAKER_02: 45:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 45:22

Yeah, go time. So anyway, I got up in the morning and it was so and I got out of my truck because I drive to the top of my laneway, and then I walk about a kilometer to get into the woods, and then about another it's about five, six hundred yards into the stand. So quite a walk. But I was walking through there and it was so frosty and so crunchy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 45:42

I just didn't sound like you're walking on chips.

SPEAKER_04: 45:44

Oh, I just I just couldn't dare go into that bottom part of the woods. Because I know it's at the far side, but like I know there's deer the bed in there and like bed in the bottom, and like it would have been so loud they would have heard me coming from miles. Oh, yeah. And the wind wasn't strong enough to hold my hold any noise. Like it was just a breeze.

SPEAKER_00: 46:02

No cover sound yet?

SPEAKER_04: 46:03

None. So I just said screw it. And there's a right at the our corner, there's a big spot of cedars that I actually was able to just I literally just tucked in under and sat on the ground.

SPEAKER_03: 46:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 46:13

By looking at that plot, I had a good wind and I knew stuff was moving in and out. I saw four-point chase note the far side of the field, and that five-point walked directly at me from straight from west east side of the property, watched him walk the whole friggin' property right towards me to like 50 yards.

SPEAKER_02: 46:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 46:28

And then anyway, wait till he screwed off down straight in the woods and called to hunt for that morning. So I was a I think got home about 10 45. Just excuse me. Finally had breakfast and coffee. Went to town just because I had errands and stuff to do, and then got back home at around one, flicked on the TV, was messing around. What did you watch? Uh show called Stick.

SPEAKER_01: 46:50

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 46:51

It was about golf.

SPEAKER_01: 46:52

Oh, okay. Never mind. I don't want to hear it anymore.

SPEAKER_04: 46:54

It was about golf. All right. Anyway, had uh and the amount of stuff that lined up for this deer, just just to show sometimes just how stuff works out. And I I'm assuming everyone on this listening to this who's hunted deer has had one of these moments where like everything just worked out somehow really weirdly. Yeah. But like there's one episode left in this show. It's 2 15. There's one episode left in the whole series.

SPEAKER_01: 47:15

What's he gonna do with this dick next?

SPEAKER_04: 47:17

And I didn't watch it. Oh like how do you like how do you stop at with one episode left? And somehow I did. Yeah, because there's I don't have that willpower. Because in front of my stand to the left side where I'm looking, there's two cedar trees that are in my way every time I go hunting. Like I'm trying to look through them for deer near dark, and they're just hard to see through. They're just in the way, and they're they don't provide me a shooting lane at all to like my whole west side from my stand. And I'm like, well, shit. I'm you know what? I've been meaning to go cut those down. Just never get a chance at noon because the days are so short. You get done hunting at 10 10 11. Yeah. By the time you get home, eat, screw around a little bit, do whatever, and then you're back in the stand for 2 30.

SPEAKER_01: 47:54

Like it's dark if you have to do it.

SPEAKER_04: 47:55

Yeah, like I might as well. I'm like, I'll just go in now and I'll go cut them down.

SPEAKER_01: 48:00

No time like the present.

SPEAKER_04: 48:01

Yeah, I'm like, screw it, I'm screw it. I'm like, I got a five-day stretch of good weather, I got good winds coming up. I'm gonna go in early, I'll just cut those down quick. Deerford tree fall before, whatever.

SPEAKER_01: 48:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 48:11

I was like, I'm gonna go cut those down, give me a shooting lane in case something comes out of the bottom. Because a lot of times they come out of the bottom, come up to the top, and then follow the trees to my field.

SPEAKER_02: 48:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 48:20

And uh I was looking for my little fold-out saw and I couldn't find it anywhere. So I'm like, screw it, I'll make it work if something comes up. Like I've hunted with them all year. I can hunt with them tonight. I just couldn't find it. I didn't want to take like the big uh bowsaw or anything down there with me. Yeah, bucksaw. I didn't want to take that down there with me. I just want a little fold-out saw. Couldn't find it. Took me, I watched looked for like two minutes, I'm like, ah, whatever.

SPEAKER_02: 48:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 48:44

Couldn't find it. So I got I got out of the truck at the top of the field at like 2 30, and I took I took a I took a half hour to get to my stand. Like I just was like one step, two steps.

SPEAKER_00: 48:56

That's so hard sometimes when you just want to get in your stand and get hunting to go in slow.

SPEAKER_04: 49:00

I know I'm like shh. Like it took me like it took charging it. I got my truck at 232 and the first phone call to my buddy Ryan was 257. And how how quick it happens, I'll get to that in a second. But like I took a good 20, 25 minutes to walk 700 yards. Yeah. So pretty slow. Like I had my I had my gun kind of just sitting in the front of me. I did have I had my uh my left hand, I'm a lefty, so I have my glove off my left hand just in case I did bump something because you never know. He I because I know he's around now, like he's yeah, he's cruising. If he finds a dough, and I'm like, that's a good lockdown spot. He could just be any he could be anywhere, right? I've shot a deer walking through that before.

SPEAKER_01: 49:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 49:41

So you never know. Yeah, so you just never know sometimes. Anyway, so I got I get down around the corner and haven't spooked nothing yet. I'm like, okay, doing good. Because usually I spook some sort of dough or some sort of doe blows at me. I swear to they have it's six cents for me coming in there, but anyway, so then I get I was like maybe twelve yards from the stand. I was just about to turn left to step over like one tree, and I had good grass to get to my stand, it's real mossy. Snapped one stick. And I'm like, shit. And I as soon as I snapped that stick, I heard a big shuffle come behind me. As soon as I look back, seven point seven point I saw in the morning running directly away from me. He was bedded 30 yards from me. Yeah. But I got all the way down in there to get 30 yards from that deer before he jumped, and I stepped on one stick. At this point, I'm like, oh I'm just gonna jump up in the stand quick.

SPEAKER_01: 50:28

Did you say shit loud? Can you actually just break the stick? You're like, shit.

SPEAKER_04: 50:33

Might even say quietly, I don't know. But anyway, I look back and I saw him hopping away, and I'm like, I'll just get up in the stand quick. I'll let I'll let everything settle down and I'll watch him. And uh and I so I climb up the tree and I got hangers, I got those footbed hangers on full sides. Like I'm sitting on the backside of the tree, so the tree's actually like directly in the middle of my view if I'm standing straight up. Yeah. So I'm hidden in behind it, but it also gives me a rest for my gun because I'm just I'm hunting out of a hang-on.

SPEAKER_01: 50:59

Right.

SPEAKER_04: 51:00

And uh so I just stand, I basically just I basically stand on the pedestal my whole hunt facing the opposite direction.

SPEAKER_01: 51:05

You stand the whole time?

SPEAKER_04: 51:06

Pretty much.

SPEAKER_01: 51:07

Huh.

SPEAKER_04: 51:08

I'll turn around to sit if it's real slow when I'm getting if my knees really starting to hurt, and I'll just sit down, but then I'm facing dead wood, so I gotta look over my shoulders. Yeah. Like direct over my shoulders, and that's not comfy either. But so I'll probably sit. I'll probably I usually stand for like a couple hours and I'll sit for a little bit, but stand I'll just kind of like just kind of lean around the tree and just kind of look slow. But anyway, I got up in the stand. I just hung my rifle up. I just flipped down my seat, so I took my other glove off. I sat on the seat, and I texted my buddy Ryan. I just like I was like, almost made it. Just spooked a friggin' seven-point getting in here.

SPEAKER_01: 51:38

Yeah, so I was on the phone with Ryan when all this. Well, I'll let you keep going with the story, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 51:43

Yeah, anyway, so I spooked to seven, I'm like, ah geez, whatever. Get up in the stand. Not the first time I spooked a deer walking in before. So got up in the stand, I texted Ryan. I was like, I almost made it. Frig just spooked like a five or I don't even know what he was, five or seven point. I think it was the same deer as the morning, but spooked him getting in the stand. I was like, I'm gonna throw a doe bleed at him just to mess with him. Yeah, see if he'd see just see if he'd come back. It's 2.30 in the afternoon. Like by this time, well, it's like 250 something.

SPEAKER_02: 52:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 52:08

Anyway, I put my phone in the pocket. I'm and the whole time when I was climbing up the tree, I'm looking over my left shoulder, looking at where he was, get up in the tree. I'm looking on the right side of the tree, looking where he was, just trying to get eyes on him, right? Just been there three minutes, I'm already bored. I'd like to watch deer.

SPEAKER_01: 52:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 52:21

So anyway, and then as soon as I stood up straight when I slid my phone in the pocket, I noticed movement out of my left eye, and then I I looked over, and then I kind of tilted my head down and through those cedars, there he was with a whole batch of trees in his antlers, just raking the living shit out of them.

SPEAKER_01: 52:37

Like, those are my ficuses.

SPEAKER_04: 52:38

Well, like I heard I saw it and heard at the same time. Like I just heard ant like stuff crashing, and I just just saw looked up and I just saw those antlers, and then his head came up and turned. I went, holy shit. I didn't even I when I first saw him, I didn't even think it was him. I never really like his antlers were so dark and he looked so different in person that I thought he would.

SPEAKER_02: 52:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 52:57

And anyway, then as soon as I snapped my gun up, and this these are the two cedars that I would have been cutting down if I found my saw. Now I have to shoot through them.

SPEAKER_02: 53:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 53:06

Anyway, as soon as I got my scope up, perfect hole. I found a perfect hole between two branches. But like, I don't know if I took that shot again, if I actually knew where the bullet was. That bullet could have been inch from that branch. Like I had a I had a gap.

SPEAKER_02: 53:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 53:19

Like I had a gap to shoot through. He was perfect broadside, right side facing me. And I just found his front shoulder, and I just I found his front shoulder, and all I could think was two things. I'm like, I'm like, I have a hole. I can make that shot work. And two, holy shit, this is actually happening. Flick the safety, found his front shoulder, let it fly. And I was lean weird on tree because I'm lefty, leaning on a left side of a tree. So I'm like over far right trying to get my scope in on him. So I don't even know how I had the gun rest against the tree at this point because everything's already a blur. And he and he took off running. And so, like immediate everyone immediate thing when you shoot a deer and it starts running, it's like, did I hit him? Yeah. Did I hit him? But he was running after look, think about after he was definitely hit because he ran so low. He didn't spring at all. He was just low to the ground, just running, like scared, just running. He ran ten yards to the right, turned, and ran straight towards me. As straight as a line towards me, he possibly could have.

SPEAKER_01: 54:15

And then I saw red, rover. And then I saw the big ass buck going over.

SPEAKER_04: 54:18

I saw the wide rack, and I'm just I saw that just that giant frame come towards me. I'm like, and I knew it was just an absolute mega. Yeah. But the thing is, down in that valley, like I've had megas show up randomly before. Like there's always a time when you get the first picture.

SPEAKER_03: 54:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 54:32

Right? So I didn't even exactly know if it was him. I was 95% sure, but I just I couldn't say it was. Yeah. And uh so the difference of the phone call or the text to Ryan saying, I'm gonna throw a doe bleed at the seven point to me calling him. Four minutes. Not speaking English, one minute. One minute? One minute on the time. I was on the phone with him. And that's the only reason it doesn't do seconds on the phone, but it was like that text to the phone call that he's down. Not even I shot him, that he's down because he ran towards me. He only went 20 yards, 25 yards max.

SPEAKER_02: 55:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 55:03

He ran 10 yards ahead of me, maybe 15 yards toward me, and there's a ditch with a little brook. And he just pile drove. He just I just saw him go down, and then not a noise. Just woods went silent, besides the fact my heart was beating straight out of my chest.

SPEAKER_01: 55:15

Well, yeah, because I was on the phone with Ryan. Ryan's like, oh, hold on. Just one sec. Logan's calling. Ryan's Ryan's like, I think Logan just said he shot like the giant buck that spin on camera, like, how big? Ryan's like, I think like the real big one, like the real big one? I was I was at work driving, and anyways, I almost hit somebody. I was like, whoa, that's crazy. Um then Ryan's like, I gotta go and I was like, well, shit, send me a picture when you get there. And um, it was him. It was him. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 55:38

Yeah, because I I don't even know how, because like, because yeah, I had Ryan on the phone, one one minute difference. Yeah, that whole thing happened, like the deer was dead.

SPEAKER_02: 55:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 55:46

From the time I texted Ryan, I'm gonna throw a dough bleed at a seven point to he's down. And I so I don't know how had my rifle, have it all my gloves, had everything, somehow climbed out of that tree stand, which isn't fun with two hands and two feet. Yeah, let alone I had Ryan on the phone the whole time with my gun climbing down the stand. And I I was like, because he was like, Well, can you find him? I was like, he's right in front of me. I'm like, you're just staying on the phone, I can probably find him.

SPEAKER_02: 56:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 56:08

Anyway, so I'm walking towards the ditch because I knew he was kind of, I knew the roughest city in front of me where he was because he was still kind of hidden when he was running. He depth perception was off how fast it happened. Anyway, I walked towards the ditch. I'm like, I know he's right here in the ditch. Let me find him. He's like, okay, I have the phone on him. I took one step, looked down, there he was. Head underneath the water. Like it's a the brook's only like a foot wide, like half a foot deep. But his right antler was kind of underwater, and left side sticking up and the squiggle on the back side of his antler. Yeah, that's all that's the first thing I saw sticking up, and I just read just reaming in my pocket for my phone. I called Ryan back, I'm like, it's him. I'm like, it's I'm like, it's friggin' him. And then and then I hear him yelling at his dog to get inside. You get in there because then I called my buddy Chad, who works uh um he's sir or works at uh trailer store and just a little town outside of us. Shout out and uh Salisbury and uh anyway, he I guess he was working with his buddy or with well, co-worker or buddy of ours. Anyway, he's like, I gotta go. Logan just shot that big deer and just ran out the door like mid-afternoon. That's all he said. Just ran out the door of work, got in his truck and was gone. Yeah. He showed up in khakis, beige Nikes, beige Nikes, a nice, a nice sweater and then an orange vest he had in his truck. Just run, and there's a picture of him on my trail cam I found later on, but him just sprinting across the cot, just running towards me. It was a oh, it's the funniest picture of the whole time. But the response time of the boys is just insane.

SPEAKER_02: 57:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 57:41

How fast everyone showed up. Well, I I heard sticks in the woods, I thought it was another deer coming. The boys were already there.

SPEAKER_01: 57:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 57:48

Like, I'm like, holy shit.

SPEAKER_01: 57:49

Oh, yeah. Well, everyone was like off work, kind of waiting around for something like that. Yeah, because I called Brian and then.

SPEAKER_04: 57:54

And then by the time I was almost done, the phone call Chad, Lane's FaceTiming me. Yeah. And by this time, I'm balling. Like I am crying my friggin' eyes out when I finally got my hands up. Because I when I got up to him, I stood there and I looked at him for like 10 minutes.

SPEAKER_02: 58:06

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 58:07

I didn't touch him for 10 minutes. I sat on the bank and looked, I went over and sat on the bank. He just dropped out of the just stare. Yeah. So I couldn't even grab him. Then Lane got on FaceTime and like and uh I was crying. I couldn't even speak English, and Lane's like, well, let me friggin' see him. And that's the first time I that was the first time I touched him, was like third phone call, probably like ten minutes in. Yeah. And I just was like, I was reaching down just to grab him, and I was just shaking. Just heard of it.

SPEAKER_01: 58:30

Walking up in a big buck, you know, it's just it's like a unicorn, like, man, this thing's real. Like they can die. Like it's crazy because you think like they're just it's it's just something that you can never achieve. They just seem, I don't know, fake almost at first. It's like this mythical creature that you've you've got. You harvested, you did it.

SPEAKER_04: 58:50

My neighbors who were well hunting the same fella. Yeah. They were now he he texted me and said, Is that you? And I said, Yeah, I got him, he's down, and he's like, and he's like, We'll be right there. And so like I had all the boys there, and it was yeah, it was just what'd you shoot him with?

SPEAKER_01: 59:05

You got your custom rifles?

SPEAKER_04: 59:07

Uh my uh shot of my Brighera. Same gun I've mentioned on here before, but Brighera B14, HMR, Night Force NXS scope and nightforce rings and a trigger tech trigger in it.

SPEAKER_01: 59:18

6.5.

SPEAKER_04: 59:19

6.5 Creedmoor. Yep. Shooting uh 143 grain ELDXs.

SPEAKER_01: 59:23

Oh yeah, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 59:25

Yeah, and they do they've they've done like three three years with that gun and 36 points in deer. Yeah. So it's been a been a pretty lucky gun for me, I'd say. If you go four years moves, that's 54 points. Yeah, yeah. But now it's been a good gun, and every single bullet I've shot through that gun that hit an animal was this it was the bullet was against the skin on the far side. Yeah. Just all the energy right through that whole deer. And he was quartering towards me a little bit, so the bullet went in. My first rib came out it blew through the third rib, um, clipped the top, clipped the mid shoulder on the on the back side where it was exiting because the shoulder was tucked in and then it's just right against the skin. Hit it with my knife when I was skinning them.

SPEAKER_02: 59:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:00

Whole bullet right there, but no, he was yeah, it didn't take long when I was getting him out, like not one. Couldn't even grab a piece of long. He just I shot him when he was raking trees, and he didn't have a breath and just ran 20, like 20 yards and was like didn't move an inch. Yeah. And he grassing that ditch, there was not a sound besides, even if there was sound, I couldn't hear it over my heart.

unknown: 1:00:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:18

That's all I could hear was just ringing through my ears, my heartbeat. I was like, holy god. And then yeah. Finally got him, Ryan got there, and we got him up on the bank and started looking at him just like even like the whole night, like I had I had so many great friends stop out to see him and just chatting, just shit, chatting with the beer around the garage and just staying there and just looking at the whole time just doesn't feel like it still happened. Even now, like it only happened, like this is Tuesday, I shot him on Thursday.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:43

It still doesn't feel it's crazy.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:45

So give us the uh the rough scores, Logan.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:49

Uh my buddy's a score. We did a did a green score that night when we got uh well when I when we all got a little sell down and we got back and he got the tape on it at uh green gross is one ninety-eight and two eighths or one ninety-eight, one eighty-nine and two eighths, and uh net score came out at one eighty and an eighth.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:10

Yeah. So he won't shrink that much.

SPEAKER_04: 1:01:12

No, very, very little deductions and you know, just yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:16

Typical. That's typical.

SPEAKER_04: 1:01:17

Yeah, typically white tail. He's uh with he's a mainframe twelve with uh five little kind of half-inch kickers, he could call him 17 or call them whatever you want.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:26

But yeah. No, that's uh yeah, it's a credible number. Yeah, when I finally got off work, got a chance to see him the next day, I think, or something.

SPEAKER_04: 1:01:33

But you went over with Ryan.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01:34

Yeah, uh to see him hanging in her buddy's garage, I was like, Yeah, it's just it's crazy because Lane had some other deer there that uh because Lane butchers some and he does Euromance and all that stuff. He had some other deer there that were really nice bucks. And then then there's yours, and it's just yeah, it's crazy. Dorf them all.

SPEAKER_04: 1:01:50

Yeah, it's it's like if you even if I look at my picture on Instagram or Facebook of like my nine point last year, I look at that deer and I'm like, that was a nice deer, and even like it was at the taxidermist. Like I got him mounted and like Lane was at the tax dermis. He even said like when he was there looking oh no, oh, with this with his beautiful 12 point he shot this year.

SPEAKER_01: 1:02:13

144.

SPEAKER_04: 1:02:15

Is that what it needs to be, or that's what it is?

SPEAKER_01: 1:02:17

That's what it is. I think that's what Lane said. He scored 144. Nice deer.

SPEAKER_04: 1:02:21

Yeah, I think it was 150 gross.

SPEAKER_01: 1:02:23

Oh gross, yeah. Net net, I think. Yeah, it goes by net.

SPEAKER_03: 1:02:26

I just yeah, I guess I was thinking gross score. But yeah, either way shot a yeah, shot a beautiful deer. But yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 1:02:32

Yeah, no, it's uh no, it's it's a good story, and yeah, it's very uh emotion. Deer hunting, right? It's it's the highest of highs and the lowest of lows sometimes. Oh yeah, because even like depending on how it goes.

SPEAKER_04: 1:02:46

You don't realize how much it hits you when you do hear one is dead. Yeah. And then hits you even higher when you do shoot one. Yeah, like well, like when you think about it, like the amount of money and time and hours you spend in a stand doing plots, like all summer, like like shooting this deer has been, if you look at it in one way, it's been a been a th like I I grant I didn't really hunt them in twenty three because it was after that other other deer, but you look at the time, just invest even between the last one to move on to this one.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:03:12

But uh but no, yeah, between those two deer, like here lies Ian now. Yep, here lies here lies Ian.

SPEAKER_01: 1:03:19

Uh yeah, no. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:03:24

I'm like, because I didn't think I'm like one of the but everyone's same question to me now is like, well, what are you gonna do next? What do you do next? It's not like I shall like and like I would I would have had I probably wouldn't have cried as much as I did. But I would have been just over the moon with 140 plus 50 plus like I I just want to shoot a good mature white tail that's like even if it's gonna be 140, 50 inch deer, because in New Brunswick, there's there's a lot of deer that the best there's there's big bucks, and then there's like what you call them, Kale, there's just like monsters, just oh yeah, just massive. I mean, well, like around here, like a a good, even mature buck that's five and a half, six years and a half around here on average, like it's probably gonna be one thirty to one sixty on the big side.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:03

Which is which is a big buck. Which is a giant you're getting here is is just yeah, it's it's a whole other thing. That's the thing.

SPEAKER_04: 1:04:08

Like everyone's like, what are you gonna do now? What are you gonna do now? And I'm like, I'm still gonna enjoy the hunting. Yeah. I'm gonna love being down there. Like, I don't have to shoot a deer to love it.

SPEAKER_00: 1:04:17

Yeah, yeah, you don't have to shoot a bigger deer than you did last every year either.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:20

No, and you're learning that, Caleb, because you're a little picky this year and stuff.

SPEAKER_04: 1:04:24

I mean, and but the hard part was, and I'm like, I'm like, oh, it'll be fine. Like my nine point last year was good, but then I I went down in the basement tonight and I had my rack in my hand. Yeah, and then I looked at my mount. Threw it outside, and then I looked at this and I went, Holy crap.

SPEAKER_01: 1:04:40

Oh, yeah, it's it's it's uh it it is.

SPEAKER_04: 1:04:42

I gave my nine point and my ten point down there, and I have dad's old deer down there, which I think was big, yeah. It was 145 or 148 gross. And I slid that rack inside of this rack, and it was always near touching at any point. And I'm like, okay, maybe what do I do next? Well, I'll get the bow out, I'll get the bow out, and that'll be a special hunt in itself. Like, I don't know. Like, I'll I'll still remember the like you still keep hunting for a nice patriot. Well, even even last year I shot that nine point with Ryan. Uh Ryan came, Ryan was there first, everyone was kind of working at that point last year. But Ryan came out, me and him hauled that deer together.

SPEAKER_01: 1:05:15

Oh, I heard about it.

SPEAKER_04: 1:05:18

Me and him all the way all the way through the woods. And it's just that's a memory I'll never forget. Yeah. The 10 point before that, you and Ryan showed up. Me and Ryan shot a deer on the same. Yeah, me and Ryan shot a deer on the same up. I called him, he just got his knife to get his deer.

SPEAKER_01: 1:05:30

I was hunting, and I'm not a big I'm not much of a deer hunter. I I get bored way too easily. I like my other hunting. But uh, yeah, remember Ryan called me, I was in the deer stand, he texted me, and I just called him. I was like, Did you get a deer? He's like, Yeah, I'm like, Yeah, I'm bored already. It's been 10 minutes and I'm coming over. And then and then yeah, you called that night so that you got yours. So we're like, oh okay, right on it. It was cold that night. We went over there. And then remember me and Ryan were coming down, and um, we saw you pick up an antler. We thought it was a deer, and we saw like we knew you'd been going to the gym a little and stuff. We saw you just grab it and like pick it right up. Holy shit he's strong. And then we're like, oh, it's this rattling antler. But we thought you just picked the deer. Yeah, we just saw the light and the antler come up, and it was just like behind a hay bale or something like that. We're like, whoa. But yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:11

But then like, but then that year, like me and Ryan shot deer on the same night, and I still like and I'll never forget. We were like all the boys were sitting around a half circle in the back of the garage, shooting the shit, yeah, looking at two bucks on a tailgate.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:21

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's fine.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:23

And same thing, it's just another great memory with all your friends around that you wait for because it's gonna happen one night for each of us. Every s every single year.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:32

And yeah, this box gets me a little bit of random attention, but like what I'll remember is being in the cut with a beer, yeah, with me and a few of my best buddies, all just standing around a deer just because that's what we love doing.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:45

That's the best part about the whole thing.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:47

And the fact that the deer sold for 180.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:50

Yeah. I mean, yeah, it'll be something No, I know.

SPEAKER_01: 1:06:53

I know what you're saying.

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:54

It'll be something I never forget, and I am very fortunate to have the opportunity to shoot it, shoot a deer like this, because there's 'cause like I could it, like if I didn't if I watch one more episode of that show or cut down those cedars, I could still go the rest of my life and not shoot a 160.

SPEAKER_01: 1:07:07

Now the real question is what everyone's wondering, did you finish sticks the last episode? It was pretty good. Was it good, yeah? Yeah, the same steak as the other episodes.

SPEAKER_00: 1:07:15

Did you have any stakes off them yet?

SPEAKER_04: 1:07:17

Nope. Not yet. Nope, nope, I haven't uh take the yeah, I'll take the backstraps off them, but basically I use Basy Deer, I like it for ground. Yeah. Rice beef nowadays, making it in the ground with a little bit of pork fat and have ground for till mid next year. And that's that's kind of what I like having a deer for around. But no, yeah, definitely, definitely gonna plan on having the backstraps at the camp of the boys again.

SPEAKER_01: 1:07:39

So perfect. Well Logan, congratulations again. Hell of a deer. Glad you'd come out. Thanks, man. Um and tell us all about it. And uh yeah. Pretty pretty pretty cool. Pretty cool shooting like um almost like a mythical creature, something like that size, you know. It's pretty neat.

SPEAKER_04: 1:07:57

Yep, might never might never see him again.

SPEAKER_01: 1:07:59

They're not invincible.

SPEAKER_04: 1:08:00

Yeah, I guess I guess gotta brag what I can until I'm all and I forget.

SPEAKER_01: 1:08:04

Yeah, yeah. All right, thanks.

SPEAKER_04: 1:08:07

Thanks.