Gundog Nation
A show to bring together gundog enthusiasts, trainers, and handlers with discussion focused on all breeds and styles of gundogs.
Gundog Nation
Roe Reynolds - From Arkansas To Alaska: Building A Life With Hunting Dogs
#56 A life built around dogs doesn’t happen by accident—it’s earned in pre‑dawn loadouts, long tracks through brush, and quiet choices at the tree. We sit down with guide Roe Reynolds, who turned a youth of coonhounds into seasons guiding black bears in Idaho and brown bears and moose in Alaska, all while building spec homes back in Arkansas. Roe explains how he rigs from the box, why spring baits and fall fruit orchards require different strategies, and what makes a balanced bear pack: cold nose to start, speed to push, heart to stay, and just enough standoff to come home in one piece.
We explore how hounds create fair chase clarity. When a bear trees, the team can confirm sex, check for cubs, and coach new hunters—often kids—into steady, ethical shots. Roe shares practical insights on lion and bobcat tracks, why some gritty lines don’t belong on a 400‑pound boar, and the real risks of wolves cutting into a race. Then we move north, where Alaska’s salmon-fueled brown bear hunts and slow-burn moose days test mental toughness in fly‑in camps powered by hot wire and determination.
Back home, deer dogs and named crossings keep community alive, and we get candid about public land pressure, boat-ramp chaos, and staying safe during turkey season. Roe also pulls back the curtain on his world-level Olympic trap background—reading angles and wind at 80 mph—and how that discipline informs the way he reads tracks, terrain, and time. Throughout, the theme stays rooted: preserve heritage, mentor youth, and use dogs to make hunting more ethical and more human.
If you care about hounds, fair chase, and keeping our hunting culture strong, hit play, share this with a friend who loves dogs, and leave a review so more folks can find the show. Subscribe for weekly tips on training, health, nutrition, and real-world tactics from Gundog Nation.
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I'm Kenneth Witt and welcome to Gun Dog Nation. Gun Dog Nation is much more than a podcast. It's a movement to build a community of people around the world that like to watch a well-trained dog do what it's bred to do. Also, we want to get our youth involved into the sport of gun dogs, whether it be hunting, sport, or competition. We want to build a community of people united to preserve our gun dog heritage and to be better gun dog owners. Tune in to each weekly episode and learn about training, dog health, wellness, and nutrition. We will also offer tips for hunting with dogs and for competition, uh, the hunt tests, field trials, and other dog sports that involve gun dogs. Please go to our website, gundognation.com and subscribe to our email list. We'll keep you informed weekly with podcasts that are coming out. We also will be providing newsletters with training tips and health tips for your dog. You can also go to patreon.com forward slash gundognation and become a member. There are different levels of membership on there. Just go check that out. Also, we'd like to thank Sean Brock for providing the music for this show. The introduction and the outro is Sean Brock. He played everything on there except the Banjo by Scott Vestal and the Dobro by Jerry Douglas. Sean is a neighbor of mine up from over in Harley, Kentucky. I'm just across the mountain in Hyden, Kentucky, and he's a super talented guy. But most of all, I want you guys to check out the Creakers. They are also from Hyden, Kentucky, and this is an up-and-coming bluegrass and country band. And these guys are hot. They're all over TikTok and YouTube. You will hear these guys because of the year. So they will be on the radio. They are very talented. Their videos are going viral on the net. These boys are family. Two of the lead singers, one drops with my daughters, and the other one is my cousin's son. So he's family. But check them out. Check out the Creakers. Also, last but not least, if you want to buy a hat, koozie, t-shirt, or even gun dog supplies, go to shopgundognation.com and you can purchase any of those items. Thank you so much for listening. It's a privilege to have people that want to put up with me talking about dogs all the time. I actually enjoy what I do, and I'm so glad to have this opportunity. And thank you. Hey, it's Kenneth Witt with the Gundog Nation podcast. Welcome back. Today I'm coming to you from a different location. I'm in Red Lodge, Montana, uh, talking to a guy that uh I kind of envy his lifestyle, and he's got some interesting stuff that we're going to talk about today. And uh ironically, I had his mother here on the podcast a few things back, and she's kind of she's very popular herself, uh Summer Reynolds dog hunt supply. But this is her son Ro. Roe guides hunts. He has ran all kinds of hounds. We're gonna talk about it. He's uh he and I is gonna we're gonna have fun on this. So uh Ro tell everybody who you are and what you do for a living.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I'm Roe Reynolds. Uh Summer is my mom, like he said. Uh I for since I graduated high school in 2018, I've guided out west in Idaho with black bears, uh, with dogs, and we've also done some lion hunts. And then I just recently got my Alaskan's guys license. So I've been two years up there, I guess what you would call apprenticing as a packer, uh, hunting coastal brown bear and moose. So I've done that, and then really my real job is I build spec houses, so that's kind of how I get it to all work out where I have enough free time, you know, to be able to go do the fun stuff.
SPEAKER_02:So how does a man from Arkansas end up guiding what in the way northeast?
SPEAKER_00:So when I graduated, I was a big time gun hunter. My last three years high school, I hunted every night to the point like I would sleep in the lunch, like during lunch break in high school, I'd slip off to the counselor's office and lay on her couch and sleep because I'd be out all night. But whenever I graduated, mom booked a bear hunt with dogs because I always said that's something I want to do. It's like my graduation present. Well, we got up there and kind of befriended the guys that was running the outfit, and uh they had a young guy there the whole time, and all he was just kind of jockeying people around, hauling hunters around. I was like, Yeah, you know, if you'll ever need any help, I'd love to come up there. Well, the next year they called and I went up there and just kind of packed for them, which packing for them turned into now. I'm driving a side-by-side hauling hunter, which turned into, well, now we've got 15 extra dogs the next year, which turned into okay, this is your pack of dogs, and then turned into helping Joey and Rosa with their kids, which is it's almost like I have a second family up there, really. And uh, I don't know, just accidentally fell into it, really.
SPEAKER_02:Uh, you know what? I I envy you. I I I do I'm a landman row, and I do that to kind of afford to do what I'm I'm not a guy, but I'm I'm hunting all yeah. This is the first time I've done this, so I I've been up here for about six weeks hunting in different states. So you sound like you got the bug maybe worse than me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it's bad. Uh it's funny, Dad's always said, when is enough enough? And I'm like, Well, my tags ain't enough, so I gotta get somebody else to go just to be a part of it, you know. Um we have a lot of fun. We were killing uh in in the prime, we were doing 22 in the spring and 22 in the fall. So you just want to say we're looking, we're harvesting 44 bear a year, uh, and probably looking at another 30 in the spring and the fall that doesn't actually, we don't actually get killed. You know, go in and look at them either young or have a south cubs, you know. I that's one good thing about bear hunting with hounds that a lot of people don't realize is is I can walk into most of the time people that are that are going on a bear hunt with dogs, they've never killed a bear. They've tried to, they've been, you know, to Canada and hunted bait, and either there wasn't a good enough hunter or or the cars just didn't fall the right way. But uh I'm not saying it's guaranteed, but the good thing about dogs is somebody like me or your guide or whoever who's very experienced, I mean, I've probably skent over a hundred bear, you know, and probably seen I don't know, you can do the math 44 a year times five, whatever that is, more than that. Uh, you know, if we walk into a tree, I can tell you, okay, well, that's a sow, which every once in a while you'll miss a sow or a boar, but that's with anything. I can tell you, you know, if she's if she's got cubs, if she's got cubs and they're not in the tree with her, you know, you can tell if she's lactating and all those things. And and you can also sit back and instead of it being in a really intense situation, now there is times where it can be an intense situation, but that's with anything. Um we can set a kid down, you know, eight, nine, ten-year-old kid, this is the first bear they've ever seen. Instead of them having to make a snap reaction out of a stand or out of a blind or something, we can sit down and we can look at this bear, and I've done it, I've done it with a bunch of kids. Uh sit down and I'll take a carry a Ruger 5-7 pistol. And I got a green laser on it, and I'll sit there, all right, Fred, or whatever your kid's name is, and I'll draw that laser down on where I want him to shoot, and and you can put him in sticks, you can, you know, put him with a good brace, and just really probably make the most ethical shot that you can make and be a hundred percent certain of what you're harvesting. Where a lot of times, you know how it is the heat of the moment, you shoot a deer and it's 140 inches, and then you get up there to him and he's 65 inches, you can take that out. So you're you're you're able to harvest more mature or even like even in a problem bear scenario, you know, if you have a bear that that you're having trouble with, you can uh you can really dumb it down, I guess is the best the best way to explain it. Uh in the same way with lines.
SPEAKER_02:Now, when you're doing that, bro, what what's a you know, and I don't know if you guys are different. I I've never hunted bear with dogs. I've bow hunted kind of, but guys I talk to in New Mexico, I've I was up there, I've used some guys for uh I guess antelope and elk, but they do it all, you know, mountain line and bear too. And and I'm always, you know, being a dog guy, wanting to know, hey man, what are y'all running? And uh it's funny, Ro, they tell me, oh, I don't know. It might have this and it and that and and they honestly don't know. Yeah, and that's so many dogs. So tell me about that and tell me what you guys do.
SPEAKER_00:So that's one thing that that I'm the same as you, you know, in the coon hunting world, everybody, well, I've got a coma bread dog or a legend bread dog, and you know, they know they know the paperwork, and a lot of guys are just big into how stuff is bred. Well, you get up into that part of the world, it's a whole different ball game. And I really I haven't put a finger on why, but even those guys that are, let's say they've got 15 head and they raise a litter of puppies, and one out of that litter is gonna suit them. Well, you know, they'll spay or neuter that dog before they sell it, which doesn't really make no sense because there's no paperwork on what it is, but they know what it is, and everybody kind of knows what everybody's stuff is, but nobody really talks about it. Um a lot of be like I would say quarter hound, hound as in tree dog, and then and then bring it a lot back to like a kayak dog or even a trig, and maybe even some blue ticks. I mean, Joey he had mainly plots, he had his own line of plots that goes back to to his uh to his grandpa's stuff from way back in the day, and then you got Mike Stockton. I've hunted with him five, six years, and he's kind of got his own line of stuff, you know. Everybody's kind of got their own stuff, and nobody really knows what it is. I guess that's the best way, the best way to explain it.
SPEAKER_02:It's funny, and I've I've I know you and I have similar backgrounds in a little bit a little bit anyway, and that's just odd to me, isn't it? I mean, you're either a blue-tick man or red bone man, or you know, no, yeah, the first one.
SPEAKER_00:The first time I walked into a tree, and it was kind of one of those we're running a big nasty bear down a canyon, and next thing you know, we got four guys, it's all dumped hook, and we got 30 head on one bait. When you get down there and you can finally get him killed, you know, and you get to looking around, okay. Well, there's a blue tick, and then there's five plots, and okay, here's something that it's it's colored up like a curl, uh a cur, you know, but but you really don't know what it is, and you look around and it's just like a melting pot of all kinds of different okay, this one looks like a bird dog, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you can precurve it. I did have I had a podcast that I actually lost that we uh the the series, the whole thing we lost in production, and I never did redo it. But anyway, that guy was from up in New Mexico, and uh he's the only person I've ever talked to in the in the barrier and mountain line dog world that ran, he had full, he ran Blue Tex.
SPEAKER_00:Yep.
SPEAKER_02:And I thought that was unique. I never heard anybody tell me that. Hello, this is Kenneth Whipp with Gun Dog Nation, and I've got to tell you guys about something that I've gotten hooked on lately. It's Folicious. These are gourmet instant faux and ramen bowls that actually taste like the real deal. But I'm out in the field all day, and the last thing I want is to settle for bland camp food. Folicious is what I go to. It's authentic, the flavor, it's real ingredients, it's ready in just minutes. It's perfect for hunters, fishmen, or anyone on the go. And you can get them over 1900 Walmarts nationwide, your local ATB here in Texas. Or you can just go online at folicious.com. Trust me, once you try it, you'll keep a few stocked in in your back, your pack pack, or for your next adventure. I just want to say this, I want to add this to this commercial because I know the owners of this company. They've hunted on my ranch. Uh Joseph, uh, he and I were actually met in Colorado on a hunting trip uh that was a real adventure. They are true hunters. They've hunted the ranch, you know. And I've I've hunted with them, and Anna, she is just amazing. She's the one that came up with this idea. They were both on Shark Tank. They are amazing people. So it's I love seeing people like this have a business. And I just had to say that in addition to the commercial because I really believe in the product and I believe in the people that made the product. Be sure and go to folicious.com or go to Walmart or H E B and try their product. I promise you you will like it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I uh, you know, up there where we're at, it's it's big country. I've been fortunate enough, I know it. I spent enough time up there, I know that country like I know the country around here, you know, all the little side-by-side roads and stuff, and I know a lot of the locals. Um, but I didn't run into very many hound hunters. And I will say, the ones that I did run into, and I'm not knocking anybody, and you know how it is in the dog world, it's almost like they're in the most respectful way, you would see them, and they'd be pack have a pack of dogs, and this sounds bad, but it just looked like they had junk. You know what I mean? Just throwed together. But, you know, I I cut my teeth in the bear world with guys that that was their livelihood, you know. They had to we gotta kill this many bears to keep booking these hunters, you know, every year. So they took it serious, which I'm a pretty hardcore hunter, and if I'm gonna get up and go, we're gonna we're going to do it. You know, we ain't going to play. Um But yeah, a lot of guys, you know, it's different everywhere, but the guys that I was with, uh Back 30 Outfitters, which before that was Regier Outfitters, um, they uh they took it serious, and I mean they have to, it's their job.
SPEAKER_02:Well, let's let's walk me through it, bro. Like, how does it work? You guys, are you scouting in advance before your hunters come? You know areas where the bears are. Tell me how it works if I want to book a hunt with you and you and I you're gonna take me out.
SPEAKER_00:Well, okay. So it depends if we're gonna do a spring or a fall hunt. A spring hunt, your bears are coming out of hibernation, and when they come out, they gotta get what we call getting their gut right. So they're gonna eat a lot of grass and stuff like that. Well, then we'll have a bunch of baits set out. Kind of like if you're baiting deer. So we'll go in once a week, every three days, bait it, re-grease it. Well, we'll put these baits out, either uphill or downhill the road from like the side-by-side trail. And then what we'll do is come through there and we'll rig the dogs past it. So I'm sure you know what rigging is, but for anybody that doesn't, it's where you got your dogs tied up and they can wind one when you go by. So we'll come by this bait, you know, first thing in the morning. And a lot of times I'll take a pack of dogs on one side of the canyon to one bait, and Mike will take a pack of dogs on the other side of a canyon to another bait, and either he'll hit, you know, get it up and going, well, they always go down, and then I can dump to it or whatever. But let's say if you don't do that, you'll get out and walk into the bait, and you'll take one or two colder-nosed dogs and see if they can trail it up and get him jumped. Now that's in the spring. So in the fall, all of the uh the fruit comes on in the fall, and it's really it's pretty cool to look at. Um, there'll be what just wild orchards, and you'll just be driving, and there'll be 25 apple trees, and you just have look like Granny Smith apples hanging off. And you can eat, I mean, it's just like the ones you get at the grocery store. So we'll hunt a lot of those apple orchards, which in turn is the same thing as what we do in the spring, but it's natural food. So all this food grows at different elevations. So when the plums and the apples come on, all the game comes out of the high country and comes down. The bears come down to the low country because that's where all their food is. Plus, the winters are not as hard on them down there, so they'll keg up and hibernate uh down there. So we'll rig around and rig through these plum orchards and and uh patches of snow berries and apples and do the same thing. Uh just wait on the box to blow up and then, you know, heat it, you know, it gets up middle of the day and you ain't got nothing going, you can always find a big dark hole or the spring, you know, water running through there and walk off in there and get one started, just kind of land on it. But it's a good tree.
SPEAKER_02:Are they going up a tree?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I would say I would say 85% of your bears tree. Uh and and one reason that they might not tree is you know, they're just a slob. You know, we killed two years ago, we killed one on the ground that was bone and crocking, and and that's fun. You know, it's intense. Kind of like hog hunting with dogs, except you don't have any catch dogs. Uh but if you get to catching the like the same bear three or four times, a a bear of size, eventually they're like, Well, they ain't gonna hurt me, so I ain't gonna go up this tree. Well, then you'll wear them down or they'll stretch, they'll run your dogs out. So, yeah, but 90% of the time, 85-90% of the time, you're putting them on a limb, and then you can really see, you know, what the game is and make your decision from there.
SPEAKER_02:Or any of those dogs so gritty that they're kind of like a catch dog on a hog.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so that that's one thing. That's why they have to breed, uh, they can't run a straight coyote pound. Because like you take a Krogan bred dog, something that that's just it's meant to catch, it's bred to catch and kill. You throw them on a 430-pound black bear or 400-pound black bear, and four of them run in there and just try to dog pile them, they're fixing to be going to the vet. You know. So they they gotta have a little bit of standoff, plus they have to have the tree the tree dog in them to actually sit down and tree, which is funny because those dogs, they're just not really bred to tree, but when you put 10, 15 head in there, they don't have to tree real hard if there's that many of them. You know, they're sitting there. Most of the time the bears, when they put him on the tree, he runs up the first lamb eight, ten foot off the ground, they're sitting there looking at him.
SPEAKER_02:Do you have do y'all have to be kind of strategic in your pack? Do you need a fast dog, a baying dog, a more gritty dog? Do you try to mix it up or is it all the same?
SPEAKER_00:Man, I I'll tell you, you really you don't want one that can't do it all, because that's your weak link.
SPEAKER_02:Um and they'll tell me what it all is. What is everything that you want out of a out of a bear dog?
SPEAKER_00:Well, you need speed, you need cold nose, you need real I mean, you can get by with one one good rick dog, which is your strike dog off the box. Um a big deer deal in the bear world is they'll get what they call bear whipped, which they might be the fastest dog in the pack, but if they get up there and get swatted in the head the first time by a bear and it scares them instead of making them mad, they're gonna be in the back of the pack the rest of the time. Well, I mean, you're just at that point you're feeding one that is not really doing you anything and you're just hauling around. Um, yeah, you just gotta have one that that'll get hooked and stay hooked and have the heart to go on a two-hour bay. Because there's times you know they'll get bait and and you can't get there if they're in a bad spot.
SPEAKER_02:When those dogs are rigged up, bro, and you're all you're you're driving and you're trying to win a bear, I assume, right? That's why they're rigged up. Are there certain breeds that you've noticed has a better nose than others?
SPEAKER_00:Or you know, it's mainly everything that that we've used as a rig dog has always been bread back walker of some sort, whether it's tree dog or or running hound. Uh I did tow to about a nine-year-old blue tick one year. He was the slowest dog. I mean, he was he'd strike off a box and you'd turn him loose, and I'd beat him to the tree when they got it caught. But he was he was an honest dog. Uh he would he would get the track started and get the bear up on his feet, and then all the young dogs would come in behind him and finish the deal off. You know, most of the time there was actually a time I think we had the bear dead and was working on skinning it when the when the blue tech finally got there.
SPEAKER_02:But that'd be about like me in the woods. Yeah. Now, you guys, uh y'all, I know you you're an outfitter up there and everything. I I've actually barry hunted in northern Idaho, didn't have any success about 10 years ago, actually. Uh do you run mountain lion hunts up there too?
SPEAKER_00:Uh yeah, I actually I haven't done any lion hunts with them. Have I? Went up there and and killed a lion. Yes, I killed lion up in that part of the world. Um but we use the same dogs to lion hunt as we do bear hunt. So a lot of times in the spring, your spring bear, you're coming off of your lion season. Well, they can use the same dogs because when you're trying to kill your lions, your bears is all dend up. Now you'll catch a bear here and there that comes out on a warm day, but it's usually always in the snow. So you'll come into your spring bear season, and usually that first week you'll catch one or two lions, but that's just because what those dogs are so, you know, they've been catching lions for three or four months. I've seen a bunch of lions, I say a bunch, probably eight or so, nine or so. They're they're pretty cool. One big tom. I've seen some some uh some cats with kittens. That was pretty cool. And we've caught quite a few bobcats. Just kind of bonus game here and there.
SPEAKER_02:So those dogs will kind of dual hunt, they'll run bare and run line as well.
SPEAKER_01:Yep, yep.
SPEAKER_02:Um so once you get your license, are we gonna see Roe Reynolds outfitting up there? What's gonna happen?
SPEAKER_00:No, I I don't think I'll be an outfitter. I'd rather just, from what I've learned, you know, I got in Idaho and I got in Alaska, and if you're doing it because you like to hunt and you want to get to hunt, you want to be the guide because the outfitter is doing way too much paperwork.
SPEAKER_02:Amen. I do. I I well I kind of do do it myself at my own ranch there, so yeah, it's it's it's a it's a lot. Yeah. Uh and I've got a very small deal. But um, so you you did I I forgot that you your mom had mentioned about Alaska. What do you do the same thing there?
SPEAKER_00:We don't we don't use uh dogs, but we do coastal brown bears and moose. And we're up in we're in Dillingham. How do you hunt those? Um a lot of glassing and spotting and stalking. Uh in the fall, when when we go up to do the bear hunt, the sockeye are running up the river. Well, the sockeye run up the river and spawn and die. So essentially what you're doing is you're waiting on the fish to die because when the fish die, it's like golden corral for bears on the river. You know, there's dead fish everywhere. So you'll go out and see eight, ten brown bears a day in the afternoon. Um so that's how we're hunting them. And then the moose, it's a lot of you know, glassing and calling, and it might take two or three days of calling before you ever even see one. Just you just gotta hope that he's 50 inches. We have to have 50 inch bulls in in our unit. But I I definitely like I like bear hunting better what than any. I don't think I could ever gat guide hoofed game. I don't like guiding moose hunts. It's it's really just two different kinds of different kind of people hunt different kind of stuff, if that makes sense. I don't I don't know.
SPEAKER_02:Is it it's not enough action, is it?
SPEAKER_00:No. Yeah. It uh there's just something about that first year I went up there, we was I flew in, and of course they fly us in in a bush plane, and they'll dump us out, and basically say see you in ten days, and we got all of our food. We had two tents, coming stove, yeti cooler with all of our food in it, was already pre-froze. Uh but we actually had to run two strands of hot wire on D batteries to keep the bears out. And uh you'd be laying there at night and you'd hear of course run like a gravel bar coming down through there, and then you'd hear him hit that wire and start and run off. Uh but yeah, it's an eerie feeling when there's nothing but you and a tent in between. And yeah, and a piece, two pieces of hot wire. But uh it's a good time. It's dangerous. Oh yeah, yeah. It uh you don't realize I mean it's like everybody always says, Man, that'd be fun, that'd be fun. I said, Well, yeah, I said it's a job, and it's if you like to hunt, it ain't that bad, but I'll tell you what it is. You have to be as mentally strong as you can possibly be. Uh because there ain't no I think I want to go home. You know, when you're there, you're there till they come get you. We was in 22 days last year, as and that's 22 days no shower, 22 days no water. I mean, and there's yeah, there's no I think I want to come back tomorrow. I'll go home, take a shower, come back. No, you're just you're home until it's over with. And you've got a guy, you've got a guy sitting there that's paid a very large sum of money to come on this hunt. And I mean, at most of time that's a once-in-a-lifetime deal for for those guys, and you want to try to make it the most for them, you know, go completely over the top, but get uh it kind of can get monotonous, especially on the moose hunting deal. No internet. Oh, yeah, no, no phone service, no nothing.
SPEAKER_02:That's a lot of dude wipes, ain't it? 22 days.
SPEAKER_00:I tell you, yeah. They quit working after about day eleven.
SPEAKER_02:Dang, man. Oh man. Uh no, I I you know, I've hunted some a little bit of hardcore stuff. That that that's that's different. Yeah, it's uh And you know, like you said, bro, about guiding and how you know it's a it's a it's a job. I just hunted in Montana the last uh six days with these guys, uh, friends of mine from Texas, and they're do-it-yourself duck hunters. Well, I've been kind of spoiled. I'm I'm not I'm not an expert duck hunter, even close. Right. And I'm learning, but I've always been a ton of outfitter. So guys like you, you know, set up the decoys and do all the dirty work, and I just go sit down and shoot. Well, I I was that guy. So we had to do all that, you know. Yeah, man. I mean, I was I'm 57. I was killed, like wore out. And of course, we had one young 25-year-old guy with us, thank God, you know. But uh, hey man, it's a lot of work, isn't it? Hello, this is Kenneth Whipp with Gun Dog Nation. Many people quickly become frustrated and confused when training the retriever. Cornerstone Gun Dog Academy's online courses eliminate all the guesswork by giving you a proven training system that will help you train a dog that anyone would be proud to have in their blind. Learn where to start, what to do next, and what to do when problems arise. Visit Cornerstone Gundog Academy.com to learn how you can train your retriever. I have used this method myself. I have been through it a couple times with different dogs. I refer back to it lots of times when I'm trying to get dogs fresh and back up for hunt test season. I highly recommend them. I have actually been a subscribed member of Cornerstone Gun Dog Academy since 2016, and I would suggest anyone use it. I highly recommend it. They have an app that you can get to on your phone. You can do it from your phone, your laptop. You can't get any more convenient than that. I I've used it, it's proven and tried, and I know literally hundreds of people that have done the same thing that I've talked to. Visit Cornerstone Gun Dog Academy.com and learn how to train your own retriever.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and I tell you, like back to the to the running of the dogs in Idaho, I had a deal on my phone popped up, and it's like one year ago today, and it was me in bed and I'd forgot about it. It was me. I'd woke up, my hair's all sticking all over the place. I video myself, and I say, day 40 of getting up at 3 in the morning to go load dogs, and it's like, it don't matter what you do, 40 days at 3 in the morning if you take a nap in the middle of the day or not, you're slap or out.
SPEAKER_02:Yep. That's them guys had me getting up at 4. Yeah, yeah. Because we had to get out, and then we'd have to scout at night for the place to duck hunt the next day. They did. No, I didn't do the scouting.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I'm not, I wouldn't know what to scout for. But no, man, I I I I envy, I know, well, I envy some of it. I don't envy all that. I don't think uh at 22 days I'd I'd be fit to be tied.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it's uh that's that's one good thing about it. I've made a lot of relationships with a lot of people from from around the world, and and even in Idaho, the phone service is so spotty. And it, you know, I was when I first went up there, I was 18, 19 years old, and I guess that was the kind of the first time I just went somewhere by myself, and I was up there the first time 63 days. Uh but you don't realize how well you get to know somebody until you get get them in the truck with you for five days. You know, and this is a stranger. He just gets in at 3 30 in the morning and there's no phone service in them and just fisting and talking, and by the end of it, you feel like you've known him your whole life. You know, there's no something there on Facebook or none of that. So it's uh it's been It's been beneficial to me. You know, I'm I've got to know a lot of people in a lot of places. And as much as I travel, you know, I got a buddy that lives well, a couple of buddies that live right outside of Vegas and uh St. George, Utah, I think. And so they'll come down to to Vegas if I go to Vegas and we'll hang out for an afternoon, go to dinner or something, and they'll turn and go back. So, but it it's been it's been nice. I've I've met a lot of really good guys.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I bet yeah, I bet you've met people from all over the country that have to be, especially young. How old are you now? I'm 26, just turned 26. Okay. Um now I know you're busy. I know you've got y'all build houses there. I know you've got the store. I know you got a lot of you get time to hunt by yourself, any?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so from when bow season around here opens, do not go looking for me at four o'clock because I'll be in a tree somewhere. Uh last night we went to the foxpen. I got I've got uh 11 head of deer dogs, some half breeds, and a couple big walkers. This would lie. We went to the foxpen last night and ran until about midnight. So I didn't deer hunt yesterday, but I'm getting ready to deer hunt when I can turn my deer dogs low. So I'm ready to.
SPEAKER_02:What's the law? What's the season? And what do you do when you deer hunt with dogs?
SPEAKER_00:So the season is the same as our standard modern gun rifle season in Arkansas. Everybody around here, out of respect for everybody, uh, we do not turn loose. It opens on Saturday. We won't turn a dog loose until the second Saturday. That gives everybody the first weekend, no dogs in the woods and all the way to Friday. And then really, if you ain't getting killed by the end, you probably ain't gonna kill him. Most people are done anyway. So, you know, no running on you can't be turning dogs loose on places you're not supposed to. We're fortunate enough. We live in a small town here, and everybody, it's you know, running dogs has been a thing that's been around for longer than twice, I don't know, way longer than I've been around. Because back, well, my grandpa had a camp back in the 50s up north of town, and so it's always been a big deal. Uh, but we're real fortunate enough. We have a bunch of good guys that we all kind of hunt together. You know, I got dogs, one of my good friends has dogs, and then we all kind of hunt everybody's own everybody's stuff, if that makes sense. The way the land lays, there's probably six or seven miles that's basically continuous that we can be on it all the time. Um so I it's honestly probably around six or seven thousand acres uh that we can run on, which you know, if and there's a lot of guys that are anti-running dog, and I get it. I I like to bow hunt. If I'm hunting 150-inch deer by really opening day of deer season, I don't want somebody to cut back up to my place and dump nine head of walkers in there. You know what I mean? Um, but there's a difference in turning loaves on 40 acres you can hunt and having five or six thousand continuous acres you can hunt. You know, you can kind of control it. Um so basically what we'll do is is we'll rally up, everybody's got CBs in their truck in the morning. We'll usually meet somewhere and eat, get a biscuit or something, and then just drive around until we see a buck deer to a buck or or some does, and we'll turn loose on it. And then, you know, we hunt the same stuff all deer season and for the last my whole life, so I mean we all know where all the crossings are, so we'll all kind of disperse and just try to try to run one over the top of somebody, which it's not as easy as you think. And if you do run one over somebody, it's usually running wide open and you you're shooting at him running.
SPEAKER_02:So that's what you you're running it towards somebody, towards a shooter, towards a hunter.
SPEAKER_00:No, you're running the deer wherever the deer wants to go, and you gotta be smart enough to get in front of him.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:So so if if I turn loose here at the store, if he goes north, there's 25 crossings he's gonna can pick from, and you gotta figure out which one you think he's going to.
SPEAKER_02:So do you have somebody set up those crossings? You still running after it trying to catch it?
SPEAKER_00:Well, see, I'll turn loose and then I'm going to whatever crossing I think he's going to, and there'll be other people that's already in crossings. Um but you know, once they get past them, everybody's got to regroup and go to the next set of crossings. And I've never worked. A lot of times, say if you're at Yellow Bank Creek and they cross and you can't get him shot or killed, and you're like, well, we need to go up here, we need to go up here to Jeanette's T and you take off running wide open, you get up there and you look at your handheld, and he made a hundred-yard circle and cross back where you just come from. Now you're throwed completely out of the race. So it's uh it's kind of an art to you've got to you've got to know the way deer move, and you'll learn you you can hunt this area your whole life and get in the truck with me, and we can run dogs for a day, and you'll learn more about where deer cross than you will if you never went. Hunting out of a stand. They all cross the same places. You can get after one and you can run him almost out of the country, and he'll cross in the same place as a deer that you'd get after six miles from here, you know. It's it's like they believe it or not, it's like they got their own road road system.
SPEAKER_02:That makes sense. You know, I've got to try that one these days. I've I've hunted all kinds of stuff, but I've never that's when I was going to college, University of Kentucky, I had a friend that uh was from Alabama, and they were he lived in a region that they could run dogs. And I thought he was lying to me the first time he told me that, didn't he? Yeah, you know, it's in Mississippi too, right? In some parts of Mississippi.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you can run in Mississippi.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. I need to try that. I need to go.
SPEAKER_00:Come down one weekend and you can ride with me. Do a ride-along.
SPEAKER_02:I'll do that. I'll be back in Texas uh on probably around the first November, so yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Um now when you were younger, you you ran Coondog's lot, right?
SPEAKER_00:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02:Did you ever compete?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I did. Uh, mainly PKC. I can probably count on I I never even made my made my dog a champion or a grand night champion in UKC just because I hated UKC so much. But uh I made uh Chubbs was his name. I hunted him enough in in PKC that I made him a silver champion.
SPEAKER_02:No.
SPEAKER_00:So and a lot of that was a lot of that I was 18, 19 year old going to$30 hunts up and down the road around here. So winning at$72 at a time.
SPEAKER_02:At least you uh I do retrievers, so we don't make any money.
SPEAKER_00:That's right. It's probably it's probably more honest that way. You start putting money involved, people will get to wanting to cheat.
SPEAKER_02:It it does cause American greed to poison a lot of things.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Did you ever run beagles?
SPEAKER_00:Uh not in competition, but I've had beagles pretty much my whole life. I've got some of my deer dogs are beagles.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. So And I I would assume, like I said, I've never run deer dogs, bro. But I when I used to I used to rabbit hunt pretty heavy and had beagles, and you know, you always try to trash break your beagles from running deer. I I guess that you have to let them do one or the other, right? If not, your rabbit dogs be running deer. Purina Pro Plan. Here at Gundog Nation, we use Purina Pro Plan for our dogs. We actually use the Sport Performance Edition, which is 30% protein and 20% fat, the beef and bison. It contains glucosamine, omega-3s for their joints. It also contains uh amino acids for muscles and antioxidants. It also has probiotics that's guaranteed to have live probiotics and eat certain. There's no artificial colors or flavors. We see the difference in our dogs, we see the difference in their coat, their performance, their endurance, and also in recovery. Be sure to use Purina Pro Plan Dog Food. The reputation speaks for itself. There's a reason that Puriana has been around for such a long time. We suggest that you use it, and we are so proud to be sponsored by Puriana Dog Food.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Uh that yeah, I don't own any rabbit dogs. Well, I say that. I've got some deer dogs that'll go run a rabbit when I don't want them to. Uh but uh so I guess I do have do have rabbit dogs and deer dogs, but no, yeah. I mean, man, everybody's different. Uh it's different kindly in this part of the world because the way the land's cut up, you can get a hold to you stuff pretty easy. But I mean, I'm not going to spend a week trying or spend a bunch of time trying to break my dogs from running a coyote or trying to break my dogs from from running a rabbit because most of the time they'd rather run a deer anyway, and they'll get after that rabbit or get after that deer or coyote, and then that next thing you know, they end up in a thicket, and then they're after a deer.
SPEAKER_02:That makes sense, yeah. Uh they're all gonna run to a safe haven.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Did did you ever fool him with squirrel dogs?
SPEAKER_00:Uh yeah, not ever, never competition hunting, but I we've had the squirrel dogs pretty much my whole life. Uh had some really good squirrel dogs.
SPEAKER_02:Kills put a loop around this because you've you've worked with hog dogs, bear dogs. I ain't talked about you hog hunting yet, but uh mountain lion, rabbit, coon, deer. In your opinion, what's the smartest breed you've ever worked with?
SPEAKER_00:I don't know. I can't answer that because it's like people. There's real smart people and there's real dumb people. Uh and dogs are you'll you'll have dogs, right? Same litter, it'd be all different. Yeah. You know, I I can't honestly answer that. I've never messed with very many retrievers. I tell you, I do have I own a boykin. He'll be a year old in uh December, and he's really more of just a companion than anything. I've put him on a couple deer my buddies have shot, and he's done pretty good blood trailing. But I will say for he's pretty intelligent. To be as young as he is, I mean, and and that's a lot of the bird, you know, the retriever or the bird dog in him. Um and I probab he's probably the smartest dog I own. But you know, that that breed of dogs, they're more bred to have a like a relationship with their handler. Whereas I some hounds do. Like I noticed in when I was coon hunting real heavy and I was spending 300 nights a year with my hound, yeah, well his buddies. I mean, he knew when we got to the house I didn't even put a leash on him, and he walked in there and stood by the gate, and I took his collar off and he went in the pen. You know, that's intelligent. Um But I would say that and that's not very often that that you find a hound or a beagle or something like that, but a lot of it, in my opinion, is because there's not been a lot of time spent with them. They're all pretty smart. Um I don't know. I can't answer. I couldn't put a finger on what I thought was the smartest, honestly.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you know, I I'm I'm kind of like you. I I fool with a lot of you know bird dog breeds, but I fool with a lot of protection dog breeds. And uh man, you know, I've had some smart ones. I'm like you, it but they're all different, and you're right. It's kind of a hounds are bred to be more independent. Unlike Retriever, it's working with you all day, you know, your hand sealing and all that stuff. Yep. Um you know, I talked to you just a second before we got on here, and because I was talking to another guy this week who called me about my podcast, and he was telling me I didn't realize that in Idaho, you being in Idaho a lot, had so many species of grouse. Do you ever upland hunt?
SPEAKER_00:Uh no. Um and and I I couldn't even tell you what kind of grouse they got. I do know that I've seen a bunch of them. I've been around a bunch of them, and I've I've killed them and we've eat them up there. I'm I'm just not educated on them. I don't know why. I've never really been big into bird hunting. Uh and it's probably because there's not any quail in this part of the world, you know. Like here dad and my grandpa talk, they used to quail hunt, and there's a bunch of quail, but there there's not hardly any. I've probably jumped one cubby around here in my life, and I'm calling a cubby more than two, you know. Um but there's a bunch of grouse up there. I've I've never hunted them up there, I've never pheasant hunted. I spent a lot of time shooting a shotgun. I used to shoot for USA shooting. I've been around the world, a bunch of World Cups, and all kinds of stuff. And it's weird. It's like when you shoot a shotgun as much as I did, you really don't want to go hunt with a shotgun. I'd rather go shoot big game, you know, hunt big game.
SPEAKER_02:Well, tell me about that. What's the what's the biggest title you've ever achieved in that in the shooting competition world?
SPEAKER_00:Man, I don't I don't know. I I made the in 2017 I went to Moscow, Russia. There's three men in the United States that made the open men's team to world championships. We went and competed there. That was that was pretty tough. Uh I won second place at nationals. I think it was 2017 or 2018 maybe. That was in Colorado Springs. Um I've been to Italy probably five times to World Cups and World Championships. Uh been to Sewell, Germany. I was in North Africa two years ago at Rabat, Morocco, shot a World Cup there, been to Switzerland, Austria, Mexico, Canada. I I've I've got to travel a lot shooting.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, a 26-year-old man. You've been more countries than I have, and I was in the military. Yeah, I've definitely covered some ground. Well, I I'll I you may have to give me some shooting lessons. I, you know, I shot a rifle a lot, you know, army stuff, and I've hunted big game for years, but now I'm a bird hunter. I don't big game run as much, and I could use some work on my shotgun.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you got the same problem. You got the same problem that I have with the opposite. See, I can't shoot a rifle hardly at all. But it's because I've trained myself probably a million rounds to slap a shotgun trigger. So I get about halfway through my pull and I'm doing that.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I'm like, all right, there it is, whack.
unknown:Yep.
SPEAKER_02:I'm shooting aim a shotgun like a rifle and shoot at a bird that's moving, you know, 15 miles an hour, and that doesn't really work. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:You know, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02:Now, would you all this comp and I've got a friend at competition shoots and from dripping springs, he actually just coached the Texas State High School Championship winners.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Do you guys in that shooting world, are you shooting trap or sporting plays or is it a hybrid?
SPEAKER_00:I'm shooting international trap, so it's Olympic style. It's a like it's a underground bunker. Uh you ever been to Kerrville, the shooting range in Kerrville?
SPEAKER_02:Uh well, no, uh, Joshua Creek's the only one I've been to there, that ranch, but not the not the competition one you're talking about.
SPEAKER_00:Uh so it's uh it's Olympic sport. It's not like your single house, one machine stuff. It's a long underground bunker. It's got 15 machines, five stations. Targets can vary anywhere from 45 left, 45 degrees right. Um depending on a bunch of different factors, altitude, humidity, your targets can fly anywhere from 55 to 80 miles an hour. Um so you get some some real humdangers, and you never know what you're gonna get.
SPEAKER_02:Man, I I can't imagine it. So uh, you know, those guys, I've got my friends that shoot there in San Antonio or the curve, real the big, you know, the I guess it's where they hold the world. It's it's next week, this weekend.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, that you're talking about San Antonio, yeah. I think it is. I don't know. To be honest with you, I was so embedded in the shooting for so long that it was just like really nice to take a step back and not have to worry about it. I mean, I started shooting a shotgun competitively when I was about, I guess I was 13. So more than 10 years.
SPEAKER_02:Well, uh is there a team there and equipment where you live, or where did you get started at?
SPEAKER_00:Uh yeah, we had a school team. Um I just started, got started with some some close friends of mine uh shooting a little bit and then shot some sporting, and then uh his daughter, Kaylee Browning, she actually went to Tokyo and won a silver medal. So she was in 2012, she was in the Olympic trials, she had a really good shot at making the team. So I'd been shooting with them, and we went out there and kind of watched the trials and all the things, and I'd kind of decided at that point that I wanted to make a run at it and just kind of went from there. Traveled a bunch, been all over the lower 48 shooting shotgun.
SPEAKER_02:But you put a lot of shells out, aren't you?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah. I've shot a bunch. I've shot a bunch.
SPEAKER_02:That's pretty cool. I I wish I I I do want to be better. We might talk about that too after the after the show. So, man, I don't know that I've ever interviewed anybody your age that's done as much as in consumer as you have. That's very impressive. Uh it's actually very impressive. And I guess all that stuff, your parents just had to be happy to some degree because that keeps you out of trouble, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah, that's what a lot of the reason I was thinking about this the other day. When I I bought my coon hound when he was a year and a half old, he was, I had a guy come to me, he said, You need to buy this dog. I was hunting another dog. He wasn't no good. He said, You need to buy this dog, he's gonna be something special. I said, Well, how much do they want for him? He said, I think it's$3,500. Well, I was like 15 years old, and I'm like, there ain't no way. I ain't. So I'm like, Mom, you want to buy half a coon dog with me? How much is it?$3,500? She goes, Yeah, I'll buy half of it with you, or I'll buy it and you can pay me back or whatever. Okay. I didn't realize then, but she kept me out of more trouble because I hunted the last three years I was in high school, even when I got out of high school with my 70 at the time, I think he's 81 now, with my 70-year-old uncle, and we'd strike out, and we might drive and go to a hunt three hours away. Well, she knew I wasn't gonna get in any trouble running around with my uncle. And and I get, you know, I get hung up on something, I'd I'd go every night. I don't like to lose and I like to hunt, and you just add the who's gonna be a better hunter in there. Yeah. Perfect combination to keep me out of trouble. So yeah, if I if I ever have a kid, they'll have a hound of some sort.
SPEAKER_02:If too, you know, I just interviewed a uh a high school team in Georgia, to my knowledge, the first high school, only high school gun dog team. Really? And their teacher, who's vocational school coach, it's in uh uh Walker County, Georgia, right across from Chattanooga on the line.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And uh they compete with retrievers, or they actually use a retriever and a spaniel, cocker, and they run a hunt test and train. Well, that's pretty cool. You know, and it and it's it's it's getting a real good response at the school, the superintendent, the whole board is back in the program because you know, these kids are doing something that and it's a lot of kids that didn't even grow up hunting, you know. It's now working these dogs. When you're getting ready to go on your next hunting trip, make sure you pack the most efficient and reliable ammunition on the market. Mygra ammunition brings you the most diverse loads on the market. Mygra's patented stacked load technology is the epitome of efficiency. Two shot sizes stack together to create the most diverse and efficient line of shot shells in the industry. It doesn't matter what flyaway, what state, or what the weather, the standard remains the same. At MyGra, reliable loads that perform in any condition every single time. We're proud to have Myra Ammunition as a sponsor for Gun Dog Nation.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's uh, you know, in the dog world, it's a dying thing. It really is. I can probably count, well, I'm the only I know I'm the only guy in Quitman, Arkansas that's 25 or 26 and younger that's got dogs, you know, and hounds hunting dogs. Uh but you know, to hear like my grandpa talk about it when he was 26, there'd be 10, 15 guys pulled over in the ditch up here at midnight on Friday night sitting around a barn barrel with running a red fox. You know, that was their Friday night. Well, you don't ever, you don't see that now. I mean, you almost you almost gotta hide when you're hunting to keep people from from you know thinking you're breaking from stealing something, or you know, but that's just the way the world is now.
SPEAKER_02:You know what, and that's one of the purposes of this podcast. You know, I might not be able to make much of an impact, but is to try to get young people involved, let people listen. You know, I've had a lot of, I've had not a lot, but I've had at least two shows with girls, ladies your age, that are hunting hardcore and grew up, I don't think any of them grew up hunting.
unknown:Really?
SPEAKER_02:Like they're public land, do it yourself, real hunters. And one of them, uh one of them runs runs uh dog tests with retrievers. But you know, it's just we need to get the word out, get people off the couch and away from video games and get outdoors and and no matter what breed it is. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, especially, especially in the dog world. And you know, it's just I don't know. I don't know the best way to say it without going down the rabbit hole, but it's in my opinion, it's the most ethical way to pursue game. Yeah. I mean, anybody with a pulse can go sit up against a tree and dump a five-gallon bucket of corn out and then kill deer in two days. Anybody can do it. It's the most fair chase that there is, it's the same as like we were talking about bear, it's fair chase, and then you can be a hundred percent about you know what you're actually harvesting. Um and it's one of the oldest hunting methods in the world, and it's dwindling away.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. And we gotta preserve our heritage, and that's something I'm trying to do. Uh uh, I do two episodes a week, and I always try to at least do an episode that that's you know, encouraging young people or and anybody to get involved in it. Right. You know, to say, hey, this is fun. I was just now starting to post videos, and I might ask your advice about that because you're more of age that would know, but you know, to make to see people see the fun in what we do, you know. And um my videos are all bird hunt stuff, yeah. Waterfowl stuff playing. Hey, let me ask you this. And um, you being in Arkansas, uh, you know, probably not too far from Stuttgart. I don't know how far.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But you're in the, you know, a duck hunting mega. Do you ever duck hunt much, or do you have time?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, uh, I'm about really 45 minutes to be in the main flyway. Um, I can be in Stuttgart an hour and 20 minutes. Uh I like it. I like it when there's birds, but it goes back to what we were talking about earlier. When I was younger, I probably I did, I know I did. But at the age of 26, I'm not gonna go fight a bunch of Yahoos over a wood duck and sit in line at the boat ramp for three days. I'm not gonna do it. If I want to go, I'll book with somebody or I'll go. And I'm if I'm walk if I'm gonna go, I want it to be good. I don't want to go and it just be playing. You know what I mean? I'd rather sit at the house.
SPEAKER_02:I've heard a lot of stories, bro, on podcasts about Arkansas. Not just Arkansas, maybe in Oklahoma, but these popular public land places, man, it's a you camp out to get in there, don't you?
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah. Uh I've been on them. I mean, you see, you see all kinds of crazy stuff. They used to have bad boat races down there at Biomeda. Not as, I mean, I'm it still happens, but they kind of crack down on it. Uh but I've drove by squirrel hunting or deer hunting the bottoms two or three days before duck season opens, and there'll be 50 boats, you know, in line to the ramp and it don't open for three days. Gee. And I'm like, man, I'm just not that hardcore. No about, I mean, it's, you know, 180-inch deer, if I'm guaranteed, yeah, I might sleep there two or three days. But for me to stay through there three days, then have to boat race in there, get all my stuff set up at 3 30 in the morning, and then have some Yahoo come set up 85 yards from me and shoot at them treetop high when you're trying to work them, it's not worth going.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And calling when you're calling. Yeah. It's uh, yeah, I don't think I've never witnessed it. And the the we luckily the place I was at was so remote in Montana, you didn't really have to fight over places. But you know what? It won't be long. Even the locals up there said, you know, it won't be long, people will figure it out and start hitting that area too.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. And I tell you what, on X is a great tool. I use it. I use it every day. I use it from hunting to developing subdivisions to building houses, looking at property lines. But stuff like Onex or Land Glide, and especially Facebook and these two million public land Facebook hunter pages, and I'm not knocking the guys whatsoever, but guys that have YouTube channels like the Hunting Public, all of that is the buildup to what public land is today.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Uh it's great that there's more people getting out there, but I also think that you're getting more people hunting and and involved, but you're also jeopardizing your public land. Because I mean there's only so much ground.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And it's, you know, I'm I'm uh from the southeast, born and raised, and you know, and didn't we don't have a whole lot of public land, and I'm in eastern Kentucky, so we don't have ducks, you know, really there's no flyway, right? It's Western Kentucky. But you know, you get up here like I'm in Montana right now. The good thing about these states, and I'm sure it won't be that way forever, but there's so much public land and so much hunting, you can actually I I I the first weekend of duck season up here, yeah. I saw saw people, it wasn't much. Yeah. During the week, I don't think a hardly saw a soul.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And then bird hunting, there's like there's a place up here, it's kind of neat, uh, bro. I don't know if you've ever seen it, but it's called a block management plan. So private landowners can participate with the state of Montana, and you just sign a card that morning, drop it in a box, and you hunt that land.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And the the purpose of the card is it that pays the landowner for mistake. So I was like, I I drove by it and saw a sign. I'd heard somebody talk about it, but didn't understand it. And we stopped and I was like, man, what is that? And anyway, I I took but so I hunted four or five of those places.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But I never saw a hunter.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I know it ain't way back home. Oh. Oh, when I was 18, I hunted a Red Bird Wildlife Management Area in Leslie County, Kentucky, where I'm from.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:And uh opening day. Now I'm a hillbilly, so I can talk this way. I can say this. But if you take a bunch of hillbillies on opening day, and if it's brown, it's down. And uh this deer come walking by. We're not allowed to shoot a doe back then. I don't think you can now in the county, but it was a doe. And uh I had never deer hunted in my life. And I was in there with some buddies from college that we were all from that area, you know. Son, I mean, it was like Vietnam. I mean, it sounded like a war zone. And I people shooting high-powered rifles and it going over your head. I was like, I mean, never again will I hunt on opening day in here. But uh, you know, but think about it, you can all afford to go buy 500 acres.
SPEAKER_00:That's exactly right. That's exactly right. Going back to what you were just saying, uh I was in Missouri this spring and I was hunting public ground, turkey hunting, and uh I was hunting around the lake. I'm not gonna give you much more information than that because it's a good spot. But I took my boat. Well, I just run around this lake and I stop and listen, okay, I hear a bird up there. Well, he's up on top of this bluff. So I motor up there underneath him, and he pitches down up on top. I said, Oh man, he's over, it's over with. So I come up this bluff and I get right to the top, and he pow just right there 25 yards right over the. I said, I'm not even gonna call, I'm just gonna bushwhack you. So I look around, I pull my face mask up, and I get it pulled up, and I realize I have my sunglasses on my hat. So I took them off like this. Of course, this bird has no idea I'm even exist. I set it on a rock. And I'm telling you, I know more than get it set on the rock and grab my gun like this to go ahead and raise it up over and boom. And when it does, I hear and the tree right behind me just peppered where them pellets had hit. Well, the Course, the turkey's flopping. I can hear him flopping right there in front of me. Well, part of me was like, Man, I'd rather go up there and talk to the guy, but then again, I'm like, it's probably better off if I just turn and go back off this bluff and don't say nothing because you liable to get you know accidentally shot again if the turkey gets up or something. But yeah, it's it can be very dangerous. And I was I was probably five miles from the boat launch, but I mean that guy walked in from a completely different direction. I know he probably had no idea that I was there, and I know I had no idea he was there. That's I mean, that's what happens when you get a lot of people on public ground, you know.
SPEAKER_02:Hello, this is Kenneth Witt, and Gun Dog Nation is proud to have one of their sponsors as Retriever Training Supply based in Alabama. Retriever Training Supply offers fast shipping on quality gear. Your dog will love it. Visit Retriever Training Supply.com to purchase gear to help you train your retriever. Listen, they have some of the best leases I've ever found. It's stuff's made in America. Their leases are and they source them locally. They have anything you want. Fast, friendly service, fast shipping, just good people. Retriever training supply. You gotta be safe. And turkey season, I think, may be the most dangerous. You're not wearing orange and you can't moat up. That's exactly right. And I've there's been a few, I think there was a guy shot, maybe killed in Clay County, Kentucky, the next county over for me. But really by another hunter, you know, accidentally. You know, side side note, but uh right out this house I've seen in here at Montana, I wake up every morning, there's myriams. And I've killed Naceola.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I've killed Eastern Rio. I've never killed a Miriam. They're all around me. Every more huge.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yeah. I'll tell you, there's more birds in the western states than I think there'll ever be in the southern states. In my yeah, there's there's more birds. There's so many birds. Um, and I think a lot of it is is they don't have hardly have any coons. They don't have any pot, they don't have possums. Um they don't have a lot of the small, the small varmints that we have, you know, the egg eaters, you know, they got snakes and coons, but I was up there for five years, months at a time, and I've probably seen ten coons in five years. You know, you can drive around here and see ten coons in a night. Yeah. So and I think that's a lot of it. And and the terrain is so rough, and this is one thing that a lot of people, and especially me especially, didn't realize until I actually hunted them. Is every time you got to work in a bird and got one fired up, you couldn't get to him fast enough because there was a hen and they was doing you know what turkeys do, turkey gobbler gobbles, and the hen comes to the gobbler. Well, that's fine around here if the ground's flat, but when you're on a mountain like this, that hen can pitch from two miles away and beat you there, and then he's done for 30 minutes an hour before he starts fired up again. But uh there's a bunch of birds. I've killed some birds up there. I've guided some turkey hunts up there. Uh it's definitely completely different than hunting in the south, I would say. But very, very healthy population of birds.
SPEAKER_02:It is. You know, and there was a little bit of a a down year this year for grouse up here for sharp tailed grouse. Now the rough grouse seemed to do pretty good over in uh the other states that I hunted, Wisconsin, Minnesota, but uh they said from hail. If it hails real right when they're hatched or right before they hatch, or heavy hail will kill them out.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Um, but I see Hungarian partridge here and I see uh sharp tail grouse and Miriam turkeys here. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. What about y'all?
SPEAKER_02:Do y'all have a good turkey population down there in Texas where you're at? You know, I I had a ranch for a smaller place in Coleman, Texas, which is kind of right in the center. And it was eat up. Now, over my ranch now is in Menard, Fort McCavit, it's near junction off of I-10, if you've ever been in that country. So uh it's I don't know if it's where I'm high fence and my neighbors are high fence. I'll get birds come in and stay uh uh four or five days and then they're gone. And they'll and and they'll just it's they don't I don't hold them, and I don't feed them either.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But it's not like the place in Coleman, they just run over you.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I've I've seen places like that, and different groups of birds are it's kind of weird because first of all, they're a very nomadic animal anyway. Yeah, but you got some set some sets of birds that I can take you to a bluff line and for 25 years there's been long-beard turkeys roosted on it in the spring. They may not be in the fall, but they'll be there. And then you can go down the road 10 miles that there's never been a turkey, and there'll be a turkey there one day. And it might not ever be there again. You know, different it I don't know. I just it's it's weird. Some of them move a bunch, and some of them will be on the same pine limb every afternoon. Very strange.
SPEAKER_02:That area we're in, they're very nomadic. And then this year, I've said this a lot of times on this podcast this year, but this year I had by a white quail, and I'd never stay in there before. I've had this ranch six years. Um and but we had a lot of rain. Well, you know, hell it flooded all down through there. We got flooded too.
SPEAKER_00:Really?
SPEAKER_02:But it no, no damage to my house. My house is up on a on a ridge. But yeah, we got heavy water. Uh really. I think 13 inches one one weekend. But uh, but no, yeah, I th I agree with you. I think that now that I'm up here in these northern states and western states, seeing a lot more birds and actually a lot more everything.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. No, there game is is very plentiful up in that part of the world. Uh I've come through there a bunch. I used to drive, I used to drive from here, from Quitman to Idaho, Orfino, Idaho, and it was right at 28 hours. I'd stop in Rapid City as halfway and get a room. And then I actually drove it straight through one time. But uh yeah, so I've come through there in the middle of the night and got to see all the big mullies on the interstate, Montana, and all the cool things.
SPEAKER_02:But did you ever draw the wolf tag up there? Or do you can't even have a few more? I have not.
SPEAKER_00:I have not. Uh you know, there's wolves in that part of the world. I'm pretty sure I seen one one time. And but I mean, you ain't gonna see a wolf. That's just you're not gonna see one. And now, could it have been a very, very, very large coyote? Absolutely. Did I only have a 22 magno pistol? Of course. Uh, but uh I've I've seen wolf sign quite a bit, you know. Them boys will have the dogs get wolfed, uh, get after a bear, get the bear caught, and they've caught the bear in the middle of a wolf, then we'll a pack of wolves will come in and kill every dog there. And and kill them, stretch them for fun, you know. One grab them on the front end, one grab them on the back end, and just almost rip them in half. Won't eat them, won't do nothing. And they'll they'll almost they'll kill every one of them if they can. So that's another that's another thing that that the dog guys gotta be very careful of, especially if you're an outfitter up there, because that's your livelihood, you know. Yeah you you go in, okay, you've got twenty guys coming in in the next months to bear hunt, and you get nine of your ten dogs killed opening day. I mean, you've got your tail on a crack. Oh man.
SPEAKER_02:Them them dogs are high dollar. Oh yeah. You know, after their training. I'm sure. Yep.
SPEAKER_00:But no, I I've never never had a 1,000% that's a wolf, but uh pretty sure I seen one one time. But I've seen a lot of tracks.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. I actually got to see moose tracks in Minnesota. I've seen moose hunting in Colorado once.
SPEAKER_00:About like that.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I've never had a tag. Yeah, it's something. There's no doubt when you see it what it is. Uh but I've I've I've blasted them when I was elk hunting, but they were real way off. I've never seen one up close.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, they're pretty big.
SPEAKER_02:Pretty big. So of all all so you I couldn't get you to tell me what you think's the smartest dog. What's your favorite breed? You've had a lot.
SPEAKER_00:Uh I honestly probably a train walker, just because as far as like a one-on-one relationship that I've ever had with a dog is with my coonhound, and he's a train walker. But now, that being said, I've seen some train walkers that I wouldn't own. But that's probably my favorite. You can't hardly beat a a tri-color blanket back tree dog, in my opinion.
SPEAKER_02:I like the looks of them. I've about I was almost ready to get one after I went to Automoaks this year.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:And uh when I left there, I had to bug, but I had to talk myself out of it. So I found dog four.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. I I didn't need another one, but I I I sure like them though. I've never owned one. I've coon hunted, but I've never I've never owned coon dogs. Really? I did train uh a squirrel dog to do it to do a hunt.
unknown:Right.
SPEAKER_02:That's about it. Um it was a mountain cur.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_02:And I always like them because they're they're greedy.
SPEAKER_00:Yep. We've had curves. Uh we've had feist. I will say some of the some of the best deer dogs that we've had was half beagle, half feist, or half cur. Which you know, the big you give the beagles a little more nose to them, and then you get the athleticism and the speed from from the curve side and and or the feist side. And they were they were really kind of special. They had a little short, had legs, and was brental, brental color, so they were they were pretty cool.
SPEAKER_02:But you know, you're talking about having it, you couldn't have too greedy of a dog for bears, they'll go in and basically commit suicide, right? That's exactly right. I had a buddy raised the jag terriers in Texas, and he said you can't take them hog hunting, they'll kill themselves.
SPEAKER_00:Believe you can believe me or not, I have a video on my phone. Joey carries a jag with him when we bear hunt, and we stuck about an 80-pounder in a 12-inch culvert one day. And I'm on one side of the road, Joey's on the other, and we're looking at him. Well, he's head first my way, so I'm kind of looking down in the culvert. Well, here comes this jag, and he just goes in and meets this 80-pound bear face to face and runs that bear out of that culvert backwards into a pack of nine dogs. Goes out, crosses the road, catch him in a tree. But yeah, talk about Grit. He went in there. Talk about a dog this big, 80-pound bear right in his face and running out of the sword. I've had two.
SPEAKER_02:I swear you can't hardly domesticate them. I mean, they ain't gonna sit on your lap and be petted and watch TV. Exactly. They're just not wired that way. And they're about they're about wild, you know.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I've never seen grid on an animal like those. And they're consistently like that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and you can sick them on anything. Yeah. They just like to fight.
SPEAKER_02:They like it. Uh they they've got it. If you put that drive in any other dog, it'd be something.
SPEAKER_00:That's right.
SPEAKER_02:Uh well, so you're getting your license. You're gonna have your own business soon, or you're just gonna guide.
SPEAKER_00:No, I'm just gonna I'm just gonna I'm just gonna guide. Okay. That's uh, you know, it's guiding's a job, but you become an outfitter and then it's really a full-time job.
SPEAKER_02:So do you have any aspirations to uh quit your day job?
SPEAKER_00:No, I know I couldn't. I'd go in the hole. You'd starve yeah, I'd starve to death. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Uh so I guess you what build all during the good weather and the hunting weather you take off. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I don't ever really take off. I'm pretty fortunate my dad builds two, so I'll pawn it off on him, or if he's got something going, I'll take care of his stuff. But uh most of the time, like I've got three that are all they like is being uh clean to be completed, and then I'll have them on the market in the next week or two. So perfect timing coming in to the end of October.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Just wait till Roe, I know you're busy, and I really appreciate you taking time to get on here. Uh maybe get you back on sometime. And uh heck, we may have to go up there and I'm gonna come up there and check you out.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Uh in at your at your side business.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, we can do it. You need to come up and run some deer dogs with us this November.
SPEAKER_02:I might be able to get over there. I'll I'll be back home yeah, first around third or fourth November.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, yeah. Just you got my number, just give me a holler. We'll get together.
SPEAKER_02:I will. Roth, thank you very much. And uh you might as well give your mom a plug there. Tell everybody where to buy their dog supplies. Yeah, yeah, come to dog and hunt. There you go. She's well known. You'll if you all you do is search that name, you'll pull her up. That's right. All right. Roth, thank you so much, and this won't be our last one, I hope.
SPEAKER_00:Yep, thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, sir. You're welcome. Hello, this is Kenneth Witt with Gun Dog Nation. I'd like to encourage all you listeners and viewers on our YouTube channel to check out patreon.com forward slash gundognation. For$10 a month, you can become a member of our community and we'll have access to lots of stuff. Mainly we'll do a monthly forum, an open forum where you can ask me anything gun dog related and we'll learn from each other in community. Should be a lot of fun each month. We will do that. So check it out. Patreon.com forward slash gundognation.