The Blacktail Coach Podcast
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The Blacktail Coach Podcast
Year Two, Bigger Buck: Mark Boon's Success Story
Big blacktail aren’t a mystery when you respect their routine. We sit down with Mark Boon to unpack how a hunter who once struggled close to home stacked two strong seasons back-to-back and sealed a Pope & Young buck in September. The shift wasn’t magic; it was method. Mark traded rut-only hopes for a locating-first strategy, used trail cameras as tools instead of toys, and learned exactly where his buck entered and exited a tight bedding core. One sixty-yard stand move transformed sparse encounters into near-certainty.
We dig into the five factors and how to time sits without overthinking the moon. A storm front, a twenty-degree temperature drop, and rising pressure created the daylight window Mark needed—no scents, no bait, just a clear plan built on summer patterns. You’ll hear how data trims empty sits, how naming a target buck fuels grit, and why blacktail fidelity lets you build one season on the last. If logging or predators don’t blow it up, that buck you saw in October is likely there next October, and that changes everything about how you scout, wait, and move.
We also share the small tweaks that add up: running five to six cameras for data rather than dopamine, treating failure sets as guidance instead of dead ends, and even adding a simple access drag that sparked rubs, scrapes, and a mid-road brawl. Mark’s looking ahead to an Oregon elk tag while keeping blacktail options open, proof the system fits September velvet, October rifle, or December archery without starting from scratch. If you’re ready to swap luck for a plan and turn “maybe tonight” into “this is the window,” press play, subscribe, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway so we can dive deeper next week.
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Welcome back to the Blacktail Coach Podcast. I'm Aaron. And I'm Dave. This week we have I was almost going to call it part two with Mark Boone success story, but it's not part two. It's just year two. So you were successful last year with implementing the system, and then you were even more successful. Bigger Buck this year. Yeah. So why don't you and so this year actually is the another difference is you are now pro staff with the Blacktail Coach. So why don't you introduce yourself to the listeners? Why don't you just give a backstory of like your hunting? Like how did you get into hunting and what species you've hunted?
SPEAKER_04:Just what makes Mark Boone tick?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. A big buck, a pop and young buck when you're on the tree stand. I tell you, that's one thing. I just like this year. Thanks, Aaron. Mark Boone. I started hunting when I was about 20, I think it was 20 or 21. I was that old guy, kind of old kid, whatever, in the hunter's ed class when we had to take it in person there at Bob's there in Longview. But yeah, I always kind of wanted to. Nobody in my family does. And so I had a couple buddies, and after high school and everything else, finally just got interested in it enough and decided to start hunting. I did that for about five or six years here local. And then my buddy at work started taking me out of state. And so then I started getting more hunting experience. And first in Oregon and then Wyoming, Montana, and kind of gone out everywhere in the West now.
SPEAKER_01:So what did you start out hunting when you were 21, 2021?
SPEAKER_02:The typical western Washington, the blacktail, and rosy, rosy elk.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. And then traveling out of state, different like mule deer, whitetail, yeah, Roggy Mountain, just or anything.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Got a mountain goat, been on some moose hunts, some sheep hunts, so that's always fun. But yeah, the mule deer all over what Wyoming and Montana, Idaho, everything, and nice and Rockies.
SPEAKER_04:How successful were you as a hunter overall?
SPEAKER_02:I'd say here, not very much, right? And I think we covered that a little bit last year on my story too, my intro, but I didn't the black tail and I had more Roosevelt elk kind of a success. And that was just grinding it out. I had time off of work, and so I was able to do that late season kind of muzzle loader hunts. Blacktail, it wasn't very successful. When I started going out of state and seeing all those deer and all the game population just greater in the open country, that's what attracted me more to go out of state. Therefore, I feel like I was pretty successful, at least on seeing game and harvesting what I wanted out of state, but still never came back to Western Washington and had good success on black tail.
SPEAKER_04:Right on. Right on. Was it easier out of state?
SPEAKER_02:I think so. Do you think so? Yeah, and it's just a different style of hunting, right? The spot and stock, the glassing. I one of my first out of state hunts was a spot in stock on a good 160-inch mule deer. And me and my buddy Ed went in and seen it from three quarters of a mile, put a plan together, put the stock on, and we're successful with that. So that's awesome. That kind of hunting, it just kind of filled me, I guess, for a little bit. And it still does. But of course. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:It's definitely nice going out of state where you can see uh to get in a target rich environment, I guess is what I'm trying to say. You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, you go to Wyoming, and that's one of the places that you went, correct? And man, they got more prong horn than they do people.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, herds of hundreds of them.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. And you're just like, oh my gosh, I got a tag for that. And it's never like this back home, you know. And it's like we went out, we saw 60 to 200 antelope today. And oh darn, I didn't get a shot. But so what? You're happy seeing the game. It makes it funner, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and that's really turned into a family thing now, going out of state. And we're seeing some beautiful places where we'd never vacation. But that antelope hunt, we brought my two-year-old daughter, my wife, who doesn't love driving around in the truck just seeing antelope or game, and then finally putting a stock on whatever one you want.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, that's awesome. That's a good time.
SPEAKER_01:So why don't you tell us? And I know people may have heard the story, but a lot of new listeners, so this will be their first introduction, but your introduction to us, you took the online course and you've taken the field days, and we've gotten to know you over the last year. But how did you find us? How did we end up on your radar?
SPEAKER_04:Because we really tried to hide.
SPEAKER_02:It was social media, it was Facebook. I think it was in oh 2022 or 2021. It was a free seminar that Dave was doing, putting on. I seen it on Facebook. I couldn't make it to that seminar. I was on a hunt actually in Wyoming with my nephew. But at least that got me thinking it's like, okay, here's someone local or Western Washington, and he has all these photos and these success stories on these big black tail bucks, and it's right in my backyard. How is he doing this? That's what kind of excited me to just start following and paying attention. And I did that, I think, for actually two years before finally you got lucky the deer, and I'm just as I'm following it, I'm getting more confidence of you know what you're doing, right? You're right, you this is proven. It's starting to, and it's really just giving me that confidence. And once you got that deer, I'm like, I just gotta, I just gotta take this course and learn. So that's how I found you guys.
SPEAKER_04:We weren't a flash in the pan. Here one day, gone the next. We've been how many years are we into this, Aaron?
SPEAKER_01:This is 2026 will be going into our fifth year of officially being a company doing this fifth year of classes and boot camp and and I did some seminars prior to all this. Fourth year of boot camp, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Uh but yeah, since we've since the the conception of the black deck, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Was filled out. The name was trademarked, all that. What was the name of and you've done this naming your sets and naming your deer? What was the name of your deer this year?
SPEAKER_02:I have done it, but I'm terrible at it. Okay.
SPEAKER_04:We don't punish anyone with the names. We've got guys, and I just laugh. We got one guy that named all his bucks after cereals.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_04:So he's got Cocoa Bucks and Bucky O's. Bucky O's and yeah, just Bucky Pebbles or something.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Bucky Charms.
SPEAKER_02:Bucky Charms, that's what it was. Yes. But you that podcast you have making it personal. I think that's one of my favorite podcasts. Oh, really? If you haven't listened to it, go and go in the past and find that one. But you know, it you come up with names, you talk about it, and I totally get it. But when you run the system and you have that relationship with that buck, and you're seeing him on camera, it doesn't matter if he's got a name or not, or any that name is just for me and Dave to talk about it, right? Oh, hey, I found Bucky Pebbles or whatever, right? But you build that relationship with that buck or history with it, and it makes it personal without any of the game on. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:It's game on. It's a lot easier to get motivated to go out in the bad weather because whatever your buck's name, Hank the Tank or Hightower, whatever, they don't care that it's raining. They don't care that you didn't get enough sleep.
SPEAKER_02:I sat 16 times last year, remember, for narrow four. And it was the chess match, you call it, but it gets personal. When he came out, it was game on. It was not nervous or anything. It was like, hey, sucker, you're gonna die because this has been going on way too long, 16 times sitting here. And that's the kind of mindset there, but that's a yeah, that's a personality.
SPEAKER_04:I just want to say not everybody has that aggressive, mean mindset.
SPEAKER_01:But actually, naming them, I mean, it is a little more fun to say this year my goal is to kill sneaky Pete.
SPEAKER_04:Right, right.
SPEAKER_01:And I I'm gonna go kill Anakin.
SPEAKER_04:Right. Yeah, and so I've mentioned this stat before. They've done studies and they found out that the average hunter, okay, the average hunter will invest three years into one mature buck. Okay. And if it I've always found that if and it's I think we're dipping into psychology here, if you put a name to that and you start thinking, okay, so narrow four beat me last year. Doggone it. Well, that was my first year, I'm still getting to know him. Year two, you don't get him. Boy, narrow four has got my number. Yeah. When you really start, okay, all you do throughout the year or the years that you hunt that buck, is you build up more determination. You build up more get it done kind of factor in your mindset when you go out and hunt, where it's like you start saying, No, I gotta get him this year, and you start analyzing and you start going over your hunt plan and all this, and what was it that he figured out last year that I didn't think of, and that kind of thing, and you really start to take and break down your season, and you begin to look at your season from all these different angles, and all of a sudden it comes together with okay, now I got him.
SPEAKER_02:And that's what happened this year on my success story. Yeah, wide four was kicking my butt, you know, and doing that, and I fine-tuned it and finally got him. It was that personal.
SPEAKER_01:So last year you got narrow four, and what was the date you got him?
SPEAKER_02:It was November 15 last year.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, and so wide four this year, much earlier. It was September September 20. Yeah. So an interesting thought about this. So you really focused on patterning him over the summer, right? What's Dave say?
SPEAKER_02:You can't find there. You go. Yep. And that was all that this year was locating. Locating.
SPEAKER_01:Yep, really focusing on locating.
SPEAKER_02:And patterning him, figuring him out to that fine tune.
SPEAKER_01:And you had him during the day, so early season comes along, and it's why wait till late season, just go get him early.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, there's no waiting. There's no waiting on a Pope and Young buck. I mean, that was my goal, right? You talk in the class on the strategy, the planning, the coming up with your goals. And and it got personal with this buck. Yeah, there was no passing, they're waiting.
SPEAKER_01:It's interesting because you got it done with just using the locating aspect of the class. You didn't even have to go into sense or any uh last year we were able to do baiting and stuff, but this year it all it was locating.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and it's actually that the same area, same unit, same set in theory of narrow for what I got last year. I had to fine-tune it and I had to move my tree stand a little bit to really figure out where he's coming out of that bedding area. But yeah. How many trail cams did you have set up? I think I get I got five or six, you know, all at once. And yeah, so right now I'm figuring out a whole different area for next year. Yeah. And it's five or six. I'm really trying. We talked about it at one that one podcast about uh the classes and the pot and using trail cameras to collect that data, not just entertainment, right? And that is that is what I had to do this year to find this wide fork.
SPEAKER_01:And this wasn't something that you did as far as the locating last year. So year over year, what did you do? What was your focus more, or did you do something different with this year as far as or like confidence level, or there was a you had a different approach in year two, and uh maybe that's what I'm trying to ask is what was year one versus year two or year two versus year one? What was your the changes in your approach as you became more confident, more familiar with the system?
SPEAKER_02:I think the different approach was last year getting into that rut and counting on those scents, maybe the does in the area, using those cents every day and having all these bucks come out of the woodwork and go to that area. This time I had to go to his area. It was on locating and understanding his summer pattern and then hoping that it was going to stay the same in that September early season enough that I could set up and get him. So I think that was the different mindset was really changing the area to where he was instead of attracting him in a way, you know, like being close to where he was and attract using those scents to kind of attract him and within his range.
SPEAKER_04:So just like getting right outside that bedroom door and using those scents to make him feel secure enough to daylight in front of you? Is that what kind of like last year?
SPEAKER_01:You're not even using the scents this year. I haven't used the scent one.
SPEAKER_04:Not even the pheromone, the bedroom. Not even the pheromone.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, nice. No, and I last year I had them on my set until October 18, and then I didn't see them. This summer, when I was cataloging or getting this data from these, I had them on the set, my set that I got narrow for on, but it was only 25% of the time. It wasn't 100% of the time. I had another camera 300 yards away that he was coming on every other day. I knew that he was hitting that one. But even when he was hitting that one, my 2024 set, he was only hitting every 10 or 14 days. Uh-huh. So I knew he was getting to this point, but without going through my set from last year. And so that's what I had to fine-tune right on his travel pattern.
SPEAKER_01:So one of the things you'd mentioned to me off air was last year, I think it was off air, he came in when was it that Wide Four came in last year?
SPEAKER_02:Until October 18th.
SPEAKER_01:Until October 18. And then you didn't see him till December 31st, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So that's another part of the personal thing.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So it's that it's interesting because the had he gone on more years or whatever, that and I bring this up because this is what I'm learning with my particular spots. I have bucks who show up at certain times of the year, and then I don't see them at all any other time. They only show up for one of my sets, he'll one of the bucks will show up for a week, ten days. And that's it. I will never see him any other time. But that same week or ten days. And then my current set, it's November. I will not see them ever otherwise. So it's but it's interesting. So this year you got him in that where you saw him last year, kind of that same time frame. You just had moved. Now, was it 60 yards closer to where you were seeing him daylight? Yes. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Yep. And it really what it came down to is there's a trail going east and west, and that bedding area that you teach us how to find was all to the north. And what he would do is come out of this bedding area and he would go to the east. And so that's where my set was. But I didn't realize he was entering and exiting that that bedding area, that core area, in three different spots. There was three different trails into that stuff. And so I was in one of the trails, but not the main one. So when he would come out, he would come out from that core area and then he would go east. Well, that's when I decided, hey, on this other random trail camera that I put on there during spring and summer, he was always on this. It was like 300 yards away, but I was not getting him come out of that core area. I knew where he lived, I just didn't find that enter and exit into it. Well, after I went down another about 60 yards away, I found another trail that goes into his bedding area and he was hitting that all the time. He was either coming out of that core area at that trail, or he was coming out from these other spots and crossing where he, you know, this new set was. So that's my adjustment I made is really I'm getting them 100% of the time instead of only 25.
SPEAKER_04:Nice, nice. Yeah. And something that sticks out to me in my mind that both of you said is a point that these deer are in the same area every year. Every year they're in the same area. You know, these guys that think I see that buck in the summertime, what are the odds he's gonna be there during hunting season? If you see him, you're in his range. 51 acres. You just have to find that bedroom. You find the bedroom and you're gonna have opportunities. You just are. And we teach how to locate that bedroom and everything. I think just it it stands to say that it's important to realize that these bear that these deer don't travel like whitetail do seven to ten miles to find a donor. They're in their range the entirety of their lives. They're gonna be there year after year after year until they die. And and when you can sit there and end a season and say, Well, I didn't get the buck I wanted, and know in the back of your mind, but I can go after him next year because he's gonna be here. It ain't over until it's over, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02:That's the exciting part.
SPEAKER_04:That is the exciting part because now you can sit there and watch bucks grow. Aaron with Anakin. That's a fine example right there. Found that buck, got palmation, real unique, young buck. He's able to watch him year after year after year until he hits that hit list, until he reaches that age where it's like, okay, now let's put him on the show. Lucky that buck I killed that you had mentioned, I watched him for four years before I finally put him on the hit list.
SPEAKER_01:You know, he was not worthy.
SPEAKER_04:But just seeing and not everybody, not saying that everybody has to do this. I'm just saying that it's a luxury that you have as far as watching them grow. But more importantly, it is a luxury to know that they're gonna be in that same area. You know, don't think he's gonna travel unless predation or some kind of human development, punching homes in, roads in, that kind of stuff, logging a hillside. They may move to a different hillside, but they're gonna be in that 51 acres. So year after year, you're gonna be able to put hunts on that very same buck.
SPEAKER_02:And that's just ain't Dave saying this. This is Washington Fish and Game doing studies and saying this.
SPEAKER_04:Well, and it's experience. Aaron's experience, your experience, my experience. We've all experienced the same thing. You saw this buck last year.
unknown:Yep.
SPEAKER_04:You figured him out this year, and now you got them on the ground.
SPEAKER_02:It's fun. You could take last year's information and really apply it year to year to year, yeah, instead of that white tail or mule deer hunt where it's almost just a random thing, right?
SPEAKER_04:Right, right. But what do we say in in coaching there, Aaron?
SPEAKER_01:Build one season off, next season off the last season.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, that's how you do it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So thinking about that, was there anything so 2020 your 2024 season that you look back and realize, oh, you know what? I kind of messed that up that you were able to fix this year, or was it yes, what was that?
SPEAKER_02:September early season. I messed that up. Last in in 2024, I had the narrow four and I had the wide four coming in. Uh-huh. And of course, it's different. You could bait and stuff within, but you can but I had those bucks that September, that first week of September in the pattern still. Like that summer pattern. I didn't realize that. I should have taken and and yeah, I got the narrow four, and that's awesome. And I got them in November 15th or whatever it was, right?
SPEAKER_04:But and a great buck. Yeah, a great buck. Not just a great first buck, a great buck. A lot of guys would love to kill that buck. Yeah. And then you just went and out did yourself this year.
SPEAKER_02:The thing is, though, I got them in November when the sense and the system works the best, but I sat another 16 or whatever, 14, 10 times when really you can't if by locating, by the locating just aspect of the system, you can pattern them for that first week or two in September and maybe harvest them. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And that's what I did this year, and so that's what I learned. And going over the story on Wide Four here, I had that first week of September off because I knew that they lose their velvet, they're going to stay in that summer routine just for a little bit longer. And that was my chance to get them that early season.
SPEAKER_04:That's your window.
SPEAKER_02:And Dave, you Dave, you like the hair, the longer hair, the late season. I do. You like, I just wanted to kill this buck. Yeah. That was my goal.
SPEAKER_04:As you look around the room here, we can look at my pedestal book there. There's a summer coat on that. I killed that one September 3rd. And a nice five by five. And it's like, well, no, there's no bad time to kill a big buck.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:I take that back. When it's out of season, that's a bad time. But in season, there's no bad time to kill a big buck. And regardless of what the summer coat or winter coat is, but I do love the look of the winter coat. But it's fun, it's all fun.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. And you still beat him. You still found him.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. You still got it done. So two years in a row. Two years in a row.
SPEAKER_02:And my first uh Pope and Young. So that was the la the narrow four was just out of that. Yeah, just shy. Just shy.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And it didn't matter. I mean, score doesn't matter or anything. I had that four-point. I had it, yeah. He's a four-point. And this year, actually, wide four. We talk about it, but he's only a three-point. He's just that wide three point. He lost a fourth point last year that he had last year. But he's a poping young buck, and that's what my goal was, and got him down.
SPEAKER_04:Now, was he this heavy?
SPEAKER_02:He was not. He gained some inches on the length, and then he was not near as heavy.
SPEAKER_04:So and I gotta tell you guys, I'm looking at this buck right now in front of me, and he has got great mass. Yeah, he carries it all the way up.
SPEAKER_01:Very wide, yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Yep, yep. So I don't know they lost a point as much as it went more back into mass on him. And that's a heavy buck.
SPEAKER_02:And you could see the genetics. I'm watching some forkies and stuff like that that are really swooping wide. He's almost 20 inches wide, but I'm seeing some littler bucks that you could see this offspring. I mean, it's just that same genetics in that area.
SPEAKER_01:So I didn't actually write this in the notes when I was planning this out, but it just occurred to me. But you might actually know this off the top of your head because you're a data guy. The five factors. Do you know how many you had on that particular day, September 20th, when you were hunting? Yep. The storm was coming.
SPEAKER_02:Nice. Yep, the storm was coming.
SPEAKER_04:So again, weather weather front?
SPEAKER_02:The temperature was dropping.
SPEAKER_04:20 degree swing.
SPEAKER_02:And it wasn't quite a red moon, but it was close. Shoulder of it. Okay. And of course, we don't have the rut factor. And then the barometric pressure was going up. It wasn't at that 30.2, but it was going up and it was over 30. Nice.
SPEAKER_04:You had that. Nice.
SPEAKER_02:You really had that storm, the temperature, and the barometric pressure. Not quite the red moon. So you had three of them.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. Almost four.
SPEAKER_02:But just like Chris with Bambino last year, early season, right? That storm coming and taking advantage of it because he came out just early enough.
SPEAKER_03:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And that's all it takes. Yep.
SPEAKER_01:But and I brought that up. I'm glad I actually thought about that because that's something when we're looking at going out hunting, that even though thinking of this last week, I don't see deer on my set in October. They show up in November. But I had four out of five of the five factors almost all week. And I'm like, I have to go sit and see.
SPEAKER_04:But if it's something that you are forgetting, Aaron, is that you did see rud activity on your walk in where you normally where you saw it last year, you hadn't seen any this year, but on your walk in this last week.
SPEAKER_01:There was a little bit, yeah. A couple of rubs that were new. Yeah, a few rubs that were new, but and I could hear them moving in a couple spots. So I knew that they were close. It's just over to getting over to my area. It's that waiting for December 31st type of thing last year, where when you start seeing them. But that's when I will. But yeah, it's one of those, it's really important. And I know that has been our most popular episode. And even the original and then the replay that we did in August, that it's knowing what those days are afternoon, morning hunts, where you should be hunting setup. You know, is it I'm in a transition zone, that's going to be perfect, or I'm at the edge of a bedding area, that's perfect. Yeah. It's all those different factors and knowing all that, that data collection.
SPEAKER_02:Even if you don't take the class or any of these courses, you should follow those. Just it's bettering your odds. It's not saying just like you, it's not saying it's a give me, right? But more deer movement is happening and it's just going to better your odds. Absolutely. And it took me a while last year to figure that out, really, you know. But then after you figure it out, you're like, oh, something, there's a really good chance of something coming out. Yeah. And you can kind of call it, right? Like something happened. Not saying again, I've sat there plenty of times when there was barometric pressure going up or something, and I didn't see my target buck or a good buck to shoot, right? But it betters your odds.
SPEAKER_04:And it's something to be said, because the first couple, the first season you start thinking about the five factors. There is a sense of is this really going to work? Am I wasting my time? Do I understand this the way I need? There's some hesitancy that you have to work through. But once you get a little bit of success, and that success doesn't have to be putting a buck on the ground, it may be seeing more deer movement, and they may all be does. But all of a sudden, I've got three out of the five, and man, that deer activity just it went through the roof tonight. If I can get four, can you imagine that? And then a lot of guys, the first season they use it, they can't remember all five.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:And it seems like a hassle. Oh, I gotta check this and check this and check this. But after you do it for a season, the next season, it's like, no, I don't even think about going out without checking that first. And I know all five of them right off the top of my head, and it's not an inconvenience. I can look a week ahead. Oh crap, I need to be out on that day. Yeah because there's a high probability.
SPEAKER_01:And Aaron, you're a fine example of this because Wednesday, I was not gonna go out, but I'm like, I have four out of five. I have to go out and stand, yeah. Uh you know, or go out into my blind because it's but you saw that last year, though.
SPEAKER_04:You had some success with that last year as far as the five factors, yeah. And so this year, and it's not saying that you're wasting your time if you don't have any of those factors. It's hunting. You just have so much more confidence, and that's a huge role in being successful is being confident in what you're doing. A little success goes a long way, and a little bit of confidence can take you from a guy that that and I don't want to that that shoot something that they're not happy with, let me just say that every year, and versus somebody who's like, Man, I've reached my goal the last two out of three years, or three out of four years, or I've gone three out of five years and killed my target bucks every those three years. Man, when you do that, those seasons where you don't feel a tag, you're okay with it. It's like because I can go into next year, it's like, oh now it's getting fun.
SPEAKER_01:But you have that confidence in the system. You have that confidence because you're able to troubleshoot by what you know. Oh, I'm not in the right spot. I need to move 60 yards. You're able to troubleshoot. You did that this year. So you have that confidence. That's the great part of editing, but you have that confidence of being able to tweak the system, the tweak it to what you need to do.
SPEAKER_02:That's one thing I learned in the class, though, and not and maybe expectations are a little bit different. When you take the class, Dave, you teach us so well. It's like you do one, you do two, one plus two equals three, right? It's just like that. And you lay that out, and it's a really, really good example. But I feel like there's always going to be tweaks to whether it's your location or whether the buck just going in a different area or whatever. It there's always gonna be that tweaks. That's how important it is to get feet on the ground, boots on the ground, and get learning that area, right? You could take this class and you could think, oh, I got it dialed. But until you go and get those boots on the ground and learn that area, learn those travel past, learn that core area, learn like this one, where he was really entering into that core area or exiting that core area, you just don't have it. You have to do it, you have to do it yourself, go on the ground.
SPEAKER_04:And that's funny you say it like that because we've got a group from Northern California that's listening in, and to everybody down there, thank you so much. We appreciate all the kind words and everybody reaching out to us.
SPEAKER_01:But thoughts for shows, thank you, Anna.
SPEAKER_04:Yep. Sometimes we hear, well, our habitat's different because we're in southwest Washington, it's a rainforest. Yeah, you go down to southern Oregon, they got a lot more scrub oak, they don't have as near as much as the firs that we do up here, and you get down into Northern California, and there's I mean, even less as far as some parts down there, and guys are like, Well, we don't know what you're talking about. This is black tailed deer or black tailed deer. There's characteristics that this deer has that is going to it's transferable wherever you go. These deer are habitual in what they do, they have a sense of what they want to accomplish, they're purpose-driven, and a lot of it it's all based on survival. And so if you learned it up here, you can apply it down there, it'll work.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I was thinking another thing about the tweaks. Like when I walked in, I was doing a drag every day when I walked in the last 300 yards or so. Right, right. You had never even considered doing something like that.
SPEAKER_04:I would only do my drags like. Like two times at the most a season.
SPEAKER_01:And but because of the reaction of me just doing a little tweak like that, something that you had hadn't done, you saw the results of that. Right. I had the battle scene in in the middle of that skitter road where tufts of fur because two deer went at it, and 300 yards of rubs. So it yeah, it ends up changing what you ended up doing or thinking about doing this shit. Yeah, dang, if that's gonna, you know, you can manipulate their behavior that much.
SPEAKER_04:Right. Honestly, I've learned a lot from just the pro staff. That's the great thing about our community is that we got guys that everybody is blacktail crazy. Everybody likes killing good blacktail bucks, and we enjoy that hunt and everything. So you got all these guys with people, I should say, with like mindsets. And so guys come up with stuff all the time and learning off of each other. Yeah, I mean, bud and his locating, he's just taking it to another level. And if I'm asking him, yeah, hey, what are you looking for? What are you doing? Chris, who killed Bambino? There's some things that he's taught me over the last year, and I'm just like, that's a great idea. I and we talked about this off air. I've just got a way of doing it, and I'm just teaching guys my way of doing it. That's all it is. It's just how I do it. And some guys are better at it than I am, and I'm okay with that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So let's talk about next year. Do you have a target buck for next year?
SPEAKER_02:That's what's different about this year. I do not have one right now. Okay. But I'm running the sense, and I'm I'm got cameras out. Okay. I have an up and comer. He's a real wide two-point. Old do you think he is from looking at the pictures? I think he's hitting that four and a half. I really feel like this year or next year. I don't know. It's hard to tell. I'm not as good as you on that. Probably should send you some pictures. He's getting up there anyway, where it could really make a difference. He's almost as wide as his ears, and he's just real heavy, eye guards. This is my first year at this location. So this is my first data set that I'm getting in this area. So I don't know what the genetics are, what really happens here. Right. So it's hard to tell, but uh, maybe next year he could he has potential just to be just like this wide four right here. It's really similar.
SPEAKER_04:Guys, this is a dandy buck I'm looking at right here. It is absolutely a toad.
SPEAKER_02:Now, do you have multiple sets? I have two sets right now. Okay. Last year I had four. Okay. Learning this, and I found out somewhere a bust just because they were too open, or I didn't find that that core area. Now I have two, and I'm really just focusing on this. But mainly I had so much, and I only had that second set for a backup, right? You know, just like the cougar story coming in and busting everything out and ruining your first set or whatever might happen. But my main goal and my all all my attention was on wide four here. Nice. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Awesome. And sometimes you need to fail to succeed. You know what I mean? You find those sets that are a bust, like you were saying, that's great. Yeah. I don't count that as a failure. A lot of guys will go, well, I can't figure no. You have figured something out. You figured out that's not where you need to be. That there's something about that habitat that that deer does not want to be there. So that's a success because you've just eliminated that spot off your checklist.
SPEAKER_02:And it's not even eliminating it. I guess I should say it's not real overall bust. There was so much deer sign in there, and there was rub's galore, but I just was not in that bedroom window that you teach us to find. I was not in that area of that locating. I needed to fine-tune that, and I just went a different direction once I had these other sets.
SPEAKER_04:Taking all the activity was at night.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Gotcha.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. So next year, are you going to be branching out and finding even more sets, or are you just going to dial in on the ones that you've got to see what happens with those? Oh, it's always more. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:It's always more. It's addicting, especially when you really use those cameras and find these areas.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. I remember Bud when he first got the locating down.
SPEAKER_02:Nine sets.
SPEAKER_04:Oh my gosh. And I mean, that's during season. He's running nine to twelve different sets. But I promise you, every time he called me that season, he had another shooter, another record book book that he'd found. I think he had like seven. And I was like, seven that would make the books. And I was just like, Wow, man, you're set for the longest time. But yeah, but then he started giving them away. Of course, I got no room to talk. I've done the same thing. And that is fun. Because you just like, it's that treasure. Can I find that next treasure? Yeah. You know.
SPEAKER_01:Well, that was mine. I've got my three sets that I'm monitoring. And it's almost like, gosh, I got bucks for years that I could go after. And that's just what the three I've got. But boy, do I really want to go into this spot or do I want to go into this spot? I've talked about Kenobi and Anakin that are about three-quarters of a mile straight line away from each other, but they both show some palmation to their antlers. And I think, like in between there, I need to go scout in that spot in between there and look what's but I'm like, I don't need to go in there. I've got enough other spots that I just need to keep focusing on those because there's enough great bucks there, but it is. It's always tempting to oh driving down the road. Oh, that's some great habitat right there. Do you do that now where you're driving down the road and you're just eyeballing the habitat everywhere?
SPEAKER_02:And then you hit those speed bumps or those turtles on the freeway.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, oh, no, I never do that.
SPEAKER_02:Nope. One thing that will be different for next year is I have a lot of elk points in Oregon. And I got a couple kills with my archery equipment that I'm going to burn my elk points in Oregon and go on an archery hunt. So that September is going to be, this is going into the planning and strategy and everything. That September is probably going to be booked up, right? I don't feel like I'm going to be able to do what I did this year for next year. It's going to have to take a big, big buck because my focus will be there. But that's the cool thing about this system. You got the September early just because you're the locating, or even in the rifle hunters in October, right? You do the locating, you got it half dialed or three quarters dialed, right? But I'll probably plan on that October or November kind of time frame and set for the blacktail because I'll be doing the Elk Hunt next year.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And you on Archery, you have late Archery. So you have December as well. Yes. That is an option for you. You could wait even more. But like you said, it's they're there now. Might as well go after them now. Totally. Yeah. Totally. Why wait? So, anyway, thank you for coming on again and sharing your story. Always, it's always great to hear about someone being successful. And even realizing how their struggles turning that into success. So thank you for coming on. Appreciated hearing that. And we will talk to you all next week.
SPEAKER_02:Thanks.
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