Remy Warren (0:00)

Foreign I'm Remy Warren and I've lived my life in the wild as a professional guide and hunter. I've spent thousands of days perfecting my craft. I want to give that knowledge to you. In this podcast we relive some of my past adventures as I give you practical hunting tips to make you more successful. Whether you're just getting started or a lifelong hunter, this podcast will bring you along on the hunt and teach you how to live Wild. This podcast is brought to you by Mountain Tough and Yeti. A lot of the tactics I talk about here require you to be in top physical shape. So I partnered with Mountain Tough to help get you ready for the mountain with their science based hunter specific training app. You'll get in shape and mentally tough able to tackle any hunt. Because we really believe this will help you be more successful. As a listener to this podcast, we're giving you six free weeks to get you started. Just use code livewild. Well everyone, welcome back to Live Wild podcast. Now this time of year is always fun for me because as these tag draws start to pop up, hunt plans start to come into place. So this week we're going to look at Hunt Planning 101. What is that first step when you know you have a tag this year, maybe it's something that you planned or maybe you just drew something unexpected. The question is, where do you start? Well, today I'm going to break down everything step by step, especially for those that like a real tactical approach to something. And I have an order in which hunt planning really comes together. Well, as someone that's really planned hundreds if not thousands of hunts for both myself and guided clients, there really is a method to my madness. And when you hit the ground running for your hunt by pre planning and really putting a lot into the planning phase, you're going to feel more ready. So this week we're going to go through the 20 steps to getting your hunt dialed post tag draw. So let's jump in now and get to planning. So it's that time of year for western big game hunting. A lot of people, maybe they're saying maybe it could be from somewhere else and you say, I want to go on an elk hunt. This year I applied in Colorado, I applied in New Mexico, I applied in wherever, and, and a lot of those results are starting to come out. You could also be somebody that like lives out west and you know, maybe your, your state, you applied for a special hunt or maybe you already picked up a general tag in a, in an area that you've never hunted or maybe it is somewhere you've hunted before and you start to think ahead to the season coming up and you go, where do I start? This is a question that I often ask myself, right? It's like I do this, I've done this hundreds if not thousands of times. And where I start, when I learn that I've got a tag or a hunt, I think the more systematic you are about it, make sure that you cover all the bases. And there is a little bit of, in some ways just like a little bit of finesse to it, a little bit of science as far as getting the right plan, going to make the most out of whatever tag you have. You know, for me this year I've applied pretty much I applied forever. I've applied in pretty much every western state. Some states I did points only just to kind of plan stuff for down the road. Some states I applied for and essentially goose egged. I really haven't drawn any tags yet. You know, last year I was talking about I drew too many tags in this year I'm like, I haven't really drawn much but I did get a couple more general tags and a few over the counter the tags early this year. And so because of that I'm kind of building out my hunt plan for those. So I've got some mule deer tags, some other tags like a couple like expedition style. An expedition style hunt planned in the, in the Northwest Territories for caribou this year. And so I was kind of building my schedule around that applied to my home state of Nevada which those draw results aren't out currently but should be very maybe the day after this podcast comes out. Maybe I should have held this podcast so I could really like use that excitement. But it could be let down too. I've seen a lot of zeros come up this year on things that I've applied for and some things that maybe I kind of expected to apply. But I have tags. I'm, I'm planning those hunts and I'm really excited about, you know, getting in and doing a lot of the planning for the tags that I already do have. So what I wanted to do today is kind of go through this checklist. I jotted down in a somewhat order like the various steps and maybe I'll throw this. How about this? I'll just throw this like step by step on my blog. So Remy warren.com youm can go there, check it out because it'll just give you like a little bit of refresher because it's so Hard to, like, hear something and think about it. But I do want to break down why I. And the way that I look at certain things. So let's just dive in. You know, we can talk about it. In the way of maybe you drew a limited entry tag. Maybe you drew. You just picked up a general tag. Maybe you got a leftover tag somewhere. Maybe you're hunting in an area in your home state, but it's a different area than you've hunted before. Maybe you got a general tag and you're like, dude, I want to go check out a new mountain range. Where do we start? So the first thing that I always ask myself, step one say we. We logged into our a portal for a big game tag draws, and we go, dang, man, I drew a tag. Step one, what do I do? First is we're gonna say, where is it? Right? Where is that tag? What unit is it in? Where in the state, where in the country compared to where you live? We're just identifying the very basic things. Sometimes a lot of people use, like an application service, and they're like, you got a tag and they don't even know where what the. The unit or the tag is. Or. Or maybe you're going, hey, I want to go hunt somewhere different. Well, where do you want to hunt? Let's. Let's pick the place first. Oftentimes a tag comes with that place, but it's good to first identify, like, where. Where is it? Where. Where am I going now? Step two is like, what tag is it? And I asked, I asked that question, like, okay, is it a archery elk tech? These are things that, like, you'll know. But I'm just asking these questions of, like, in the sequence of thought process. And as we build this out, you're going to really start to see the sequence of thought process and why some things I try to do before others or as important in this kind of logical order in some way. Now, of course, like, it doesn't. You don't have to do this exactly this way, but this is the way that I like to think about it when I go and I realize, like, hey, I've applied for maybe 10 states and I'm hoping, you know, I put in for maybe some really good tags and I'm trying to draw. Hoping to draw maybe one tag. And okay, I get a tag. And I didn't really wasn't planning on drawing that tag or got lucky, you know, like last year I drew a moose tag, and it's like, whoa, okay, now I really got to look into where's this tag at? You know, I knew which area I put in for, but logically, where is it and what. What tag is it? And so, like, what tag is it? Is an archery, is it rifle, is it potentially both. Where there's a lot of tags, like Wyoming, you could draw a certain type of an elk tag, and it's good for a rifle. But if you get an archery stamp, you can hunt bow season and rifle season. What tag is it? And then really, what are the rules? So the first thing that I do, I drew a tag, even a tag that maybe I've applied for but haven't really investigated. 100. The first thing that I do is I sit down and I. I read essentially front to back, the regulations. I read all the rules on hunting methods. I read all the rules on the entire regulation. And then really focus as well on the season dates, the unit boundaries, and potential, like, ways that you can use the tag. So that's kind of like the first thing. What tag is it and what are the rules? Now step three, I mentioned it in the, you know, through reading regulations. What are those season dates going to be for for this particular hunt? Some hunts have real long seasons where you go, hey, it's. This tag is good from the beginning of October to the middle of November. Okay, Some. Some seasons are literally a week long. And it's like, well, that's when that season is. You know, oftentimes you look at these when you apply. But it's really good once you have the tag, you know, when you apply. Often you're looking at it as like, this is something that I might have. But you never really dive into the real planning portion. So after reading through the regulations and know, knowing about the state or about the potential rules for this unit, for wherever I'm going, I'm really now paying attention to those season dates. What are those season dates? Okay, so I look at those season dates and then step four becomes time and schedule. And this is, you know, whatever you do, you're gonna have to find time for the hunt. So you gotta ask yourself, first thing I ask myself for any trip, any tag has to go, how much time do I have? How many days do I realistically have to hunt this? You know, that might be family obligations, it might be other things, might be, how much time off work can I get? How much, how many, how many days do I have to dedicate to this particular hunt? Maybe it's a week, maybe it's 10 days, maybe it's more, maybe it's Less how depends on how long the season is. And so I ask how much time do I have? And then I try to think about, you know, what, what my schedule might look like. So I go, okay, there's certain days that I could go, there's certain days I can't go, maybe have something else or, or whatever. So I look at the, the available dates and I really lay out, okay, what, how much time can I dedicate to this hunt? I think that's a really important thing to ask yourself right off the bat and say, okay, I have this many days for this hunt. Okay, now my next step, Step five is I start to gather intel on the hunt. And I have not, I just know how many days I might have to be able to dedicate to this hunt. But I have not picked like when I'm going yet because I really like to get into the intel portion of the hunt. And so what that, this, this step is actually a fairly long kind of in depth step. But what I'm doing is I'm gathering as much intel as possible. So a few of the things that I look at, like you could, and we'll talk about talking to people in a minute, but there's things that you can look at that don't involve you really, you know, asking anyone the first few things is I'd say, okay, within that time and schedule the season dates, what are the moon phases available during my hunt? Right. Some, some hunts are a month long. And you go, okay, well, there's a full moon here, there's a new moon here. I look at that stuff. It's all things that factor into me selecting when I might hunt. Another thing that I look at on the intel phase is just animal info, really. Okay, what kind of tag do you have? Is it a pronghorn tag? Is it a mule deer tag? Is an elk tag? And I'm going to kind of think about the information that I have, the knowledge that I have, or maybe it's an animal that you've never hunted. And I'm going to really think about, well, what kind of. I'm going to correlate the animal potential behaviors and those essentially season dates. What kind of hunt is it? And what kind of information about the animal or their behavior might be useful for this particular hunt. So let's just call it like a general octagon Montana, where I can have multiple units and I could, with the right archery enhancement kind of thing, I could hunt essentially from the beginning of first full weekend in September, first Saturday in September, through like beginning of October and then kind of going into rifle season, like late October into essentially the weekend after Thanksgiving. So massive amount of time. Three months, essentially. Okay, well. Well, what information, you know, can I glean from animal information? Well, okay, I know it's elk. They're running in September. If it's a meer tag, it's like running November. So I could plan around that potential information, the rut. And then what I'm also going to look at is just like, unit information. Some of this might come from, you know, stuff you find online, like things about a particular unit. It could come from. I mean, that regulation book, like, just even understanding the unit boundaries, it can come from looking at, like, my Onyx mapping app, and we'll look at E scouting a little bit later. But even just the initial, like, okay, what, what does this unit kind of entail? What. What kind of stuff is there? Is it a mountain unit? Is a desert unit? Is it a flat unit? Is it a, you know, is it a wilderness unit? All those kind of things. I'm just gathering intel, a couple other pieces of data that I like to look at. Just historical weather for the area. Find somewhere close and just look at. What kind of weather am I going to expect? Is it going to be 6070s? Is it going to be, you know, a lot of snow? I'm trying to build out a really good story of what it's going to look like during the time and schedule for the hunt. Okay. Because all this information can play into the planning process. So I'm going to. I'm going to have that. I'm going to have that weather info. I'm going to have the unit info. I'm going to just kind of get an overview of the unit. Right. Another thing about intel is, like, if I can find people that have hunted there before, that is absolutely the best intel you could ever have. It doesn't even have to be, where should I hunt? Because a lot of people don't want to tell you where to hunt. But what should I expect? What are the animals normally doing this time of year on this tag? What should I expect for, like, trophy quality? Is this an area where if someone was there, hey, you saw a lot of really good animals, man, you really struggled on the hunt. A lot of people really struggled. When did they hunt? Early, late, you know, just trying to build that kind of thing. Another thing that I'll look at is I'll go back in and look at you. Maybe I looked at this when I was applying, but maybe it's Something that, to refreshes. What are the success rates on this particular hunt unit tag? What are, if there's any kind of like state data, harvest report data of okay, what kind of animals were being taken? You know, some states will show like success rates and then break it out into antler points. 4.5, you know, three by three. Like they'll break it out that way. Or, or they might have a particular on like pronghorn. Some states have like, you know, estimated amount of inches of pronghorn. Like what am I looking at? What's some of the reasonable success data over maybe various seasons or my season. And then the other thing I look at is like what other tags are in that unit before I have it? Say I drew a rifle tag. It's like a November season. Is there a general rifle season right before it? Is there an archery season before it a muzzleloader season? Is there a concurrent season? Like some, some places have a, you draw an archery tag and there's an open muzzleloader season in that unit or a cow elk season. Like I want to know everything about that unit and some of that you can get through the regulations, but we're just really breaking it down in this intel portion. I try to keep it organized and say like, okay, here's the potential season dates. Here's what I'm looking at. Here's some of this info for my unit. And often I try to gather as much of that intel before I talk to people as I can. So that way when I'm talking to someone, I'm utilizing that time in a really good way. And sometimes it's good to, to talk to people in a couple stages. One after you've escouted, but just like kind of gathering information on the unit if there's someone you know, that could be really good. It's awesome too to kind of get unit information like what other seasons might be there. Because hey, maybe you could, you know, get in the unit. Like let's say I've got a tag where it's a late season tag, but there's a season right before it. Well, maybe there's other people out there hunting and they can kind of give you even more real time information when you're in the field. So just having all that information is extremely important. That intel portion, what's this gonna look like? And then I go to step six where it's, now I'm deciding what's the best time to go. Okay, here's, here's the season dates, but not always is the Opener the best time to go. You know, there's times where I plan a lot of my hunts based off of all this other information. So I'm looking at how many days do I have, my personal schedule, maybe I've got something I can't miss or whatever, maybe you can't get off work. And it's like, hey, okay, we, we can scratch those days off. But what might be, what I try to do is pick the best time. Let's say it's a four week season and I have, and I'm realistically, I've got five days to hunt. That happens a lot. You know, we all like to be like, yeah, I can hunt the whole season, but it just isn't reality. So it's nice to, it's nice to know, okay, well, I want to pick the best five days. What I often do is I use that intel information. I look at like a combination of things. Like let's say it's a late season migration hunt. And I go, man, I'd really like to just statistically catch it when there's the best weather, maybe with a good moon phase, or it's like a rut hunt. You go, okay, well this hunt maybe starts kind of mule deer hunt maybe mid October and goes through the end of November. Okay, well I think I'd rather hunt a little bit later than a little bit earlier. I'd rather hunt when the rut is more in full swing. Maybe when it I can coincide with a good moon phase in the better prime rut time, with maybe potentially historically better weather. That's when I'm going to schedule my five days. Or it could be something like, you know, early season September, archery elk hunt. And I go, okay, well you know, I could look at maybe some of the past successes or I'll even look at something like, let's say this happens a lot. I've had tags where it's a limited entry tag, it starts on a certain date and then seven, eight days into the season a cow elk hunt starts. And now there's 150 more people in this unit. Yeah, you got a limited entry tag, but now you've got people crawling all over, creating pressure going after cow elk when you've got a limited entry bull elk tag in your pocket. So in that case I'd say, dude, the best time to go is going to be before a crazy amount of people jump in there. But also you could say, well, man, it's probably going to be hot. It's like a early season. I don't Know if it's going to be the best time to go. Maybe it'd be better when there's other people out hunting and I can get intel from people that aren't chasing bulls. Right. I can use these people that I run into that are chasing cows to give me intel on maybe where bul and pick a better time frame that might be more conducive to good weather and good rut activity. There's so many varying options in this, but picking the time to go can really make or break a hunt. Sometimes it comes down to time and schedule. I have a particular general season elk tag in this year, and I'm going to hunt it like the first week of the season. I don't want to do that particular per se for my hunt style. I would rather hunt in the peak of the rut. But I just, I actually have some another hunt during that time, and so it works with my schedule. So I'm actually going to build my hunt plan based on the time that I can go. And that's step seven. You're going to get your dates. You're going to go, what are the dates that I can hunt? Based off of all this information above. And now we're going to pick our hunt. We're going to say, this is when I'm going. And once we've got those dates now we can go to step eight, which is going to be to build the hunt plan. So what we're doing when we build the hunt plan is I go, okay, what time of year is it? What type of hunt is it? I have this basic intel. I know what I'm hunting, what I'm hunting with. Now we're going to look at building out the hunt plan. So in this particular example, I'm going to be hunting elk first week of the season. So I, and I, I've looked at like, you know, historic weather data. I've been in this unit earlier in the season, too, and I'm not particularly hunting, just been in the kind of general area with other people's tags and other things. I know, man, it's normally kind of hot that time of year. And I'm also thinking, okay, well, the, the primary way that I would like to hunt this would be go in there bugling like crazy, calling an elk. That sounds awesome. But realistically, I'm probably not going to encounter that hunt for the hunt dates that I have planned. So I'm going to build my hunt plan and strategy based off of the techniques and tactics that will work for the time That I can go. I'm going to say it's early. Realistically, I'm probably going to be doing a lot of spot and stock hunting, maybe glassing. So I'm going to kind of think about that. I'm going to say, well, it's the, the bulls are probably high. So I'm going to think about, okay, they're going to be in an area where maybe they're. They're kind of bachelored up. They might be in an area where, you know, maybe some will start to rut. But without that right. Weather probably primarily going to be low rut activity. So I'm thinking of, okay, these are, you know, that's probably going to lend itself to more of a backpack style hunt. Even though this unit might have, you know, a lot of areas that could be accessed by roads, I might have to find areas where I'm looking. Outside of that. I'm also thinking, well, hey man, maybe there's more chance that these animals are hitting water and I can focus on water sources. So that's. I'm building my hunt plan based on the dates that I know that I'm gonna hunt. I'm thinking about it strategically going, what are these animals going to be doing? What's going to be the best hunt plan and what might be the best possibility to, to target and get on these particular animals for when I'm going. So I'm kind of thinking about it in that term if it's, you know, early season. Archery, animal hunt. Okay, is this going to be a hunt where I'm going to try to sit water? Is it a rut? Mule deer hunt where I go, okay, I'm going to need to find pockets of does. I'm probably going to have to be more mobile. What's this particular area like during the dates that I'm hunting? What might be a good hunt plan? I'm going to start to build that hunt plan based on all that previous information. Now, step nine is a thing that I like to think about and it's that scouting possibility. I've got my hunt dates, I'm looking at my calendar and schedule and I go, is there a possibility to get out and do some scouting? Maybe it's put out some trail cameras. Maybe it's get in the unit and just look around for a day or two. What's the answer to step night? Is there a possibility for scouting? Yes or no? Can I get in there in the summer and just get some boots on the ground? Because this is the planning phase and I like to work backwards from that is my available time for this, like building the hunt plan. Step eight. If I'm thinking about, okay, I. I'm going to hunt the beginning part of the season, probably what I want to do is have some prior knowledge of where the elk might be because they're probably still going to be there. So. So I know that summer scouting is a good possibility. So I'm going to say when I'm building that hunt plan, I'm. I need to make time to make scouting a possibility. I'm going to go in actually this spring, set up some trail cameras and utilize that information for that particular hunt. But if I was, hey, my, my schedule or the. The hunt plan was to hunt peak rut, I really don't know if that certain, like, type of scouting, targeting water and other things would be as beneficial as it would earlier in the season. Now, learning the area, yes, that, that's always good, but maybe targeting specific elk, maybe not. But just understanding is scouting a possibility in the schedule because we're going to want to plan out in this hunt plan that scouting both physically, if possible, or maybe it just means no, we can't. So we're going to have to get more information based on e scouting and intel. I think, like, Little Nevada draws will be coming out here hopefully tomorrow. And there's a couple of tags that I applied for that I thought I will probably head out scouting the day after, draw results. Like, I've got that in my mind. I'm gonna go set out some trail cameras and, and be planning for that over the counter. I'll tell you. I'm actually going to be. I will probably be scouting for that now, maybe even like shortly after those somewhere in there. I'll try to mix it up. So I'm going to plan like a summer or spring scouting trip to kind of just identify a few places that I want to go. I've got some of those tacticam trail cameras and I'm really excited to get those out this, this particular place that I'm going to use them. There's a couple wallows and water holes that I've identified, and I really want to get out and scout that out. So I'm going to go set those out and then if I draw like one of these other tags, I'm going to. While there's like a short window where you're allowed in the state of Nevada to put trail cameras out. So I'm going to go do that. I'm going to go get those tag cams out get them set up and just say, like, yeah, this is, you know, I'm gonna get that scouting in, you know, particularly on that tag. I might even, like, I might scout it and then turn the tag back if I don't find what I'm looking for. I guess, I don't know, limited time. I gotta really look. I really gotta, like, on some of this. Fill in the blanks, say, okay, well, what. What's my schedule? What could I hunt, you know, if I got lucky and drew a special tag, Can I make the most of it? And how do I make the most of it? And that, for me, might involve a possibility of scouting. It's going to involve a possibility of scouting. It's going to involve scouting. Some hunts. Like, it's not possible. Maybe you're. You live wherever. You drew a Colorado elk tag and you're like, it doesn't make sense for me to get out there. I got. I got seven days. I could take off or five days or 10 days, whatever it is. I never had to use all that time during the hunt. That's okay. Like, that's. That's not bad. It's just understanding when you're building your hunt plan, what it could look like. Do I have. Can I pencil in time for scouting? Will that take away time from the hunt? What are all these factors going into it? And this all helps build out a really solid hunt plan. Step 10, with any tag that I draw, I'm thinking about who or how, like, if anybody would go with me, if I'd want someone to go with me. If I can do it by myself, can I get help from someone? What's the hunt itself going to look like? So I've got my dates. I know when it's going to go. Now I can reach out. And sometimes some hunts, I'm like, reach out to all my buddies. Hey, I drew this sweet tag. Anybody want to go? Desert sheep tag that I drew a few years ago. Like, special tags of that muzzleloader tag last year. 1. It's fun to kind of, you know, like, my buddies reach out. And there's a lot of hunts that I'll jump on this year. And every once in a while, I'll reach out and say, hey, who can go with me? Most time I ask my dad or brother, hey, anyone want to go? And a lot of times they can't. Or maybe it's a hunt where I'm like, it just doesn't make any sense. I'm just gonna go by myself. Or maybe I know another guy. That drew the tag. Hey, you guys want. You want to hunt together? Like, knowing whether I have help, if anybody's gonna go and. And figuring that out early really helps. Now, I don't necessarily rely on that, but it helps me build out a good hunt plan of, like, how I'm gonna get there, what I'm gonna do, and when. I'm e scouting as well, like, getting intel, how. How this might benefit me. So I really like to know how kind of think about. Or at least think about how, like, what the hunt might look like. Can anyone go with me? There's, like, the fun part about tag draws, especially if you live in a state where there's tag draws and you and all your buddies have put in. It's like you circle the back. What did everyone get? You know, did anyone get anything that I can go on? And is there anything that I can help on? Is there anybody that can help me on something? It's. It's kind of part of this planning process and phase, and it can be a fun part, too, to. To kind of bounce ideas off someone because it helps in the planning process as well. Now, step 11 is a big step, and I'm gonna gloss over it here because I'm actually gonna make this its own podcast probably next week. I don't want to guarantee that, but step 11 would be E Scouting. So we've got in, like, recap. We know we. We've really dove into the units, the regulations, the season we know we now schedule and potentially what it's going to look like while we're out there. Is it full moon? Is it no moon? We've got weather data. We've got, you know, the people that are going on the hunt. We kind of think about the best time to go. We've started to build our hunt plan. Like, how do I want to think about hunting this? And now we're going to really dive into, especially if it's a new unit. But I do this on units that I've even hunted multiple times. Maybe it's been years apart. Like, there's new fires all the time. There's new. There's new road closures, and maybe even, like, very rarely is there added roads. But there's all kinds of new things that they can enter in. And I. And I do this whether I've hunted the area multiple times or it's the first time I dive into my onyx maps and really start to escout. And so the reason I like to have all this other information first, like, sometimes the first Thing is like, oh, I'm going to dive in an E scout. But you, you aren't as tactical if you don't know that other stuff first. Okay. And here's the reason. Like what I'm looking for when I'm e scouting, if I know it might be a, a rut hunt, might be different than if I know that I'm hunting. Like let's say it's a four week archery season. I'm gonna hunt the first week of September, not the last week of September. What I'm looking for for the first week of September is drastically different for elk than what I'm looking for the last week of September. And so understanding that really helps to pinpoint the E scouting because I know, okay, what the hunt might look like a little more and I can really hone in on certain things that I want to exploit for that particular time of the year. So for instance, let's say I'm going early season elk, you know, maybe it's the season, there's even a lot of elk tags that start in end of August. And my wife shot hers, I think on the last day of August last year. But you know, I might be focusing more on water. I'm gonna be focusing more on high elevation timber, above the timber line. And then as I move later, I might be focusing more on south facing slopes, thicker pockets near good feed, where it's like cows might hold up in that mid level terrain. Maybe it's mule deer and it's an August hunt. I'm gonna go early season while I'm focusing on that summer kind of summer range type stuff. And as I go into like November rut hunt or maybe a late season migration hunt, I'm looking for completely different habitat types. And so the E scouting is really going to be more efficient. When I start to think about the type of season and know those dates that I'm going to be hunting, I can really hone in on what might be more successful now based on that e scouting in the intel. And I'll say here, like E scouting. And then also once I've e scouted, I'm just going to kind of mix this into the same if, if in step five intel, when you've talked to anyone, it'd probably be good to retalk to those people and kind of, kind of get an understanding of the type of habitats that they hunted, maybe the type of habitats where they saw a lot of animals on your particular hunt. Also just having like any knowledge where you can glean from someone else that's been in there e scouting, and then just getting intel from someone else can be super beneficial. Now we're going to go to step 12, which is the hunt and camp plan. But we're going to base that off of the e scouting and the intel. So let's say we got in there and we know our dates, we know all this stuff. I've e scouted and I start to look at potential habitat types, and I go, man, for when I'm going to hunt. It looks like most of the good country that I've highlighted is like wilderness zone, wilderness study area, high alpine, away from roads. Okay, well, now we're gonna kind of understand our hunt plan is gonna be a backpack style hunt. And I'm gonna go, okay, this, this hunt really is going to be conducive to throwing everything on my back. Getting into some of these areas and. And planning it that way might be the exact opposite. I might look at it for a different tag. A late season mule deer hunt and go, okay. There's roads everywhere in this unit. I didn't realize that when I applied. Which is good or bad doesn't matter. Hey, it's a limited entry deer tag. There's a lot of roads. Okay. I'm going to plan on covering a lot of country. Maybe I want to be more mobile. And I think I'm just going to, like, camp out of my truck. Every day I'm going to cover more country till I start to find pockets of animals. Then once I'm there, then I'll probably hunt that particular area. So I'm going to go. Okay, well, I'm going to. I'm just going to keep my camp mobile. Maybe I'm like, it's a late season elk hunt. I like this particular area, but there's a couple areas nearby that might be good as well. So I'm going to just create a good base camp. Camp. It's going to be cold for this hunt. Maybe I want a wall tent or a stove, and it'd just be easier to just move out from that camp every day. Maybe I need to get back in this backcountry area. But if it doesn't pan out, I've got a base camp that I can come back to. The solid, solid base camper. Maybe I've got multiple people staying with me. It'd be nice to have them go to different places. And so just having a centralized base camp is going to be best for this particular hunt. Hunt. I really like to plan my hunt. Like after the e scouting now I'm understanding how, what is my hunt and camp plan gonna look like? And sometimes there's variation of options. So step 13 will be what are some variations and options? Let's say you get in there you go, dude, I planned this backcountry hunt and I got here and it just wasn't great. What's another option that I might have? Like, what's that backup camp plan? What's that backup hunt look like? Same thing as, like, I, I picked a spot for a big base camp. You're investing a lot of time into that anyways, that, that can be great. You know, you might have to move more every day or whatever, but it's not bad. But what are some variation in options within that step? 12, too. The other thing that I'm going to look at is, like, you know what might be the best way to go about this unit? It's a late season unit. Hey, there's a town nearby. Maybe it'd be better to just get a motel and hunt out of that town. Then I don't have to, you know, worry about food or whatever. It's cold and, hey, it's like, easy, comfortable camp. Maybe I can find an Airbnb in the area. Maybe I'm gonna, like, backcountry hunt the whole thing. It doesn't really matter how you're hunting it. When I'm looking into all that stuff, like all the logistics, stuff I'm trying to take care of now, but I build those logistics based off of, like, my hunt plan and what I think is going to be best for the unit. Step 14. I look at now, I know where I'm gonna hunt, how I'm gonna hunt. I kind of look at how I'm gonna get there, whether I fly. Sometimes, like, if you're coming from somewhere far, you go, well, I can save two days. Like, I've got 10 days. Well, two days you're gonna be driving there, two days you're gonna be driving back. So now I got, you know, quite a few less days, like six days to hunt. So what. What would be a better option? Okay, get maybe two extra days to fly, but I won't have all my other stuff. Okay, well, maybe if I do a backcountry camp, it looks like a lot of the trailheads. I could get a rental car, too. Not a problem. So it would maybe in that sense make more sense to. To fly there and have those more days in on the ground boots, on the ground, hunting. Or does it make more sense to have the things that I Might need to get an animal, like get a camp there and get an animal back. Maybe there's. I look at it and I go, do. This unit has a lot of roads and a lot of them are conducive to four wheelers side by side, something like that. And you have one or have access to one, and you're going, okay, cool. Like, for me to hunt this efficiently, I'm probably going to need that. And you already have one. Well, then it's going to be best to drive and have that kind of gear and that kind of equipment and put you in an advantage over, you know, or maybe not put you in a disadvantage over people that live close by and have that stuff. I don't know how many hunts I've been on where it's like, oh, you could have, like, I have. I personally have a, you know, side by side. So I've got like the option to take that. And there's places where you go and you. You end up hiking in because you. You chose not to go that route or whatever. And there's guys driving past you as you just busted your butt to get into a good spot. That happens all the time. There's a lot of. A lot of, like, those logistical considerations that I start to really think about at this point. Often, like, driving is the best option if, you know, for. For us guys that live out west, like, I live within pretty much the same distance of everywhere out west that I could hunt. So driving is like a really good option for me. But sometimes it's a little bit further and hey, man, it's like I look at it and go, this is going to take two days to get there, two days to get back, or a really long day. And by myself, I could just fly in, rent a car and be hunting that same day, as opposed to taking two days later and having a little bit more gear. That's the thing that I really start to look at at this point in the planning phase. I'm really, really diving into logistics now outside of just the scouting and all that stuff. And we are going to talk in depth about the e scouting and the intel portion. But this is just that loose, you know, planning phase, which now we're going into step 15, which is the loose plan of the hunt. Now I really start to break down, okay, what does the hunt look like? I know where I'm staying or the type of hunt that I'm going to do. I've e scouted. I have like, pins and other things that I want to check out. What's this loose hunt plan. Like, write it out, make it plain as day. Okay, My loose hump plan is I'm going to go into this trailhead. I'm going to backpack for five days. I'm going to be by myself solo hunting. I'm going to go to these vantages. I've got a couple ideas of places that I can camp and here's what I'm looking for alternately. Okay, I've got four friends coming with me. We're all going to drive out, out. I'm gonna bring a side by side. We're gonna set up a wall tent. Is a late season hunt. I think that, you know, we'll have my truck and a side by side. So two guys can split off and go one way and kind of scout me and another guy can go off into this canyon and go look somewhere else. Right? This is our loose hunt plan. This is, you know, saying, this is probably where I'm gonna hunt. This is what I'm gonna do. This is the type of hunt that it is. And now we've got a hunt plan. We're, we're well on our way to getting in the field and not just showing up and be like, I don't know what to do, where do I go? That's the hardest part for people to do a DIY hunt is like creating this loose hunt plan. And I think by following these steps, you feel more confident in that, in that loose hunt plan, in that planning phase of the hunt, because you're preparing yourself in a way to understand the area, the type of tag you've started to look at, places to go, and now you have a plan in place. And I think that that is the majority of the battle. Now, step 16. And this is something that once I've got that hunt plan, I do this religiously. And oftentimes I try to do it pretty seamlessly. It's like in the past, it was my least favorite part of it because it's just like the, I don't know, the anxiety of packing for these trips. A lot of times I'd be packing for myself and other people as well. Like other people going with me, camera people that might, might or may or may not hunt a lot, whatever. And that's like building out that gear list. What do I need for this hunt? I like to do this early. I like to think about the things that I'm going to need. I actually just create a note on my phone, little checklist, and I break it out into camping gear. Like even just down to the bow and whatever I start to, as I think about the things, start to write it out and tweak that list a little bit. It also helps me plan. Like, okay, this is going to be. Oh, look, I've. I've made my loose hunt plan. I'm hunting in a burn. I've got, you know, it's going to be pretty open country. It's a late season mule deer hunt. I'm going to do a lot of glassing. What's maybe some gear that I need for this hunt that I didn't need for another hunt that I maybe have or don't have. It gives me a little bit of time to think about it, to look for a sale, to save up for it, to know that like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna need some good optics for this hunt. Or you look at it and go, it's a September hunt I'm planning on. The hunt plan is to do a lot of calling. I'm packing in, I'm going like and fast and it's all timber. I don't even think. I mean maybe I would have a. I'm driving out there, I'm. I'm throwing my spotting scope in my truck. But I'm probably like thinking that I'm not going to use like a big heavy spotting scope in my setup because it's going to be all calling, moving, binocular, focused. Okay. Like just building out that gear, list the types of things that I'm going to need for the hunt and then knowing whether I have them or not and how to get them, tame them, borrow them, whatever. Step 17 we're gonna think about the success after the hunt. And this is something that a lot of people don't think about ahead of time. But I think is, is important in the hunt planning phase. Maybe this should be moved up probably sooner. I think within the, you know, I probably should have just moved that up in that like scheduling kind of thing. But one of the things that you want to think about is, okay, let's say you're successful. Do you have to check in the animal? There's certain hunts where like spring bear hunt or you gotta go, you gotta go to a fishing game office and check it in. Well, they aren't open every day. When are they open? What, what do I need to do if I'm successful on the last day? Can I leave that day or is there something else that I need to do? What's my plan with the meat? Am I bringing coolers? Am I looking for meat? Storage nearby. Is there somewhere like a butcher that I could hang it if me and my buddy both have tags and we're gonna continue to hunt. And I get it on day one, and he gets it on day 10. What, what can I do with the meat? Another huge thing that I think, you know, doesn't get talked about enough is what am I going to do with the antlers and everything after travel? Like, even if I'm driving, the CWD rules, like, you either have to boil it or get the brains out. It's not super easy. Do I have what I need? Do I have a saw? Like, now I. I try to cut the back of this. Like, you can still. If I want a Euro mount, like just a skull mount, I cut the. The. I guess it's the occipital joint off and then use, like, bring stuff that I can make sure I can remove the brains easily. So I cut enough out where I can get in there real good. And you can retain that piece of bone if you want to put it back on later. I don't. I mean, for the most part, when I have them hanging on the wall, it's all good. Like, the way that I do it doesn't really matter, but, you know, like, people are like, oh, I'll just go to the car wash and blast them out. I mean, it works and I've done that. But doesn't work that great to be 100 honest. It's messy. It's a pain in the ass, especially if you haven't boiled it. Like, I. I just bring like a power tools and just take care of it that way. Or like a drill with some wire and scramble it up in there and pull it out just to make sure. Hey, I am following all the rules for traveling back. Okay, I've got the meat boned out. I don't have any brain matter. The best is like, you know, if you can. If you just skull cap it or something like that. But having all that option sometimes on some hunts, like with pronghorn, I just. I like the skull out of his and they're smaller, so I actually just bring a. Like a. A pot with me. I boil the skull and I even bring like a little bit of peroxide in my truck and just finish the skull there. Like, I do that a lot on hunts where I just. I'm in the unit, I'm camping, I got whatever time I know that I can boil it and in X amount of time and do that. I've even gone as far as bringing my own little Compressor and like hooking it up in a, you know, like a rural campground. And they're not compressor, power washer, but for the most part, you know, having that plan makes a big difference. And, and that might, you might even look at and go, okay, that's going to take a day of like out of my hunt schedule to deal with this stuff. So that's something good to think about. Step 18 is now we're just, just getting our gear dialed. That means like this is post planning, pre hunting and this should be stuff you're doing all the time anyways. But dude, if it's a rifle hunt, when you get some new gear, whatever it is, I mean shooting your bow, shooting your rifle, shooting your muzzle loader, like getting all that stuff dialed, getting your drops in your, your charts and everything that you're gonna need for this particular hunt, like getting all that stuff set up up so you're ready to go, you're very confident with what you're hunting with a lot of hunt planning, this goes into it a lot, like being prepared in that way. So it's like when the shot opportunity, you're putting a lot of effort, time, money into this. It's not that big of an ask to be ready, to be honest. Like I, I get that it is, it takes time just like anything else. And so I think that it's really important to do that stuff ahead of time. Like, like you've got your hunt plan, you know how it's going to go. But this also like this get dialed. I'll use an example. My Muscox hunt last year, right, There's a big trip, was a long ways away. I knew it was going to be super cold and I was going to be shooting in like very inclement conditions with a lot of extra gear on. There's a lot of people that like, maybe you live in the south and all your bow hunting is practically T shirt weather. Well, what's going to happen when it's time when you're on that late season mule deer hunt and it's time to shoot with like a giant jacket on or a face mask or whatever it is, are you prepared for that? You know, practicing like you're gonna hunt, you know, for people that live wherever, you know, shoot in different weather and other things, maybe it's not such a big deal. But for people that maybe aren't used to it, like, dude, I've never shot, like there's a lot of people that I've guided that have gone on a, on a bow hunt In September, and it's, you know, it's cold, it's snowing, and they've never in their life shot a bow with a jacket on. And I think that that's crazy, but I'm like, yeah, they live somewhere where they don't need to. Thinking about those kind of things as you get dialed makes a big difference. Now, the other thing is step 19. I talk about it a lot on this podcast, but it's just getting fit, you know, putting in that time so you can make the most out of your hunt. And that's all in this post draw pre planning phase. You know, I, I mean, I just refer people to Mountain Tough because that's what they do. Like, you know, I used to try to think of ways, like, help people get in shape. And honestly, it just, you know, I. I could throw out tips or tactics or whatever, but really, it's just putting in that work. And, And I always think of it like this. Wherever you are, you can always be better. And whenever you're starting, you can always be better. I think that there is a certain time, like, you know, now is a good time to talk about it because, like, you get a tag, you know, you've got a tag. Okay, cool. It should be a lifestyle. But also, I know that that's not for everyone. So I think that once you've got the tag, that adds a little bit more motivation to just get your butt into gear. I. I know, like, as a guide and as an outfitter, I see it all the time where it's like, guys are like, I should have started two months earlier and. Yeah, you should. And honestly, like, it's the. The reality of it is just start something, get going. Get, like, start doing it. You're going to be so much better off. And then step 20 is just the go portion. It's looking back at your plan. It's. It's looking back, you know, packing and getting everything ready, and now it's time to go. This is like the most exciting part. A little bit of anticipation. You've put in this planning. You've put in the thought and the effort. You've got your loose hunt plan. Now it's time to just get out in the field and start applying the hunt tactics of this podcast in the field. But now we've got a good hunt plan, we've got our strategy, and we can kind of go into that hunt with a little bit more confidence than, you know, not having the proper plan in place. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that podcast. I think for Me, it's just exciting to be hunt planning. I really dive into applications and thinking about the hunt. It's that daydreaming portion of the the year when you really kind of like mentally get to go on the hunt and start to think about all the things that could play out and pan out. And it's fun for me, you know, to, to really put that plan together and then see it come to pass. And I actually think a lot of my success over the years has been in that planning, you know, success and planning phase and really looking into it in other. In other things too. I mean, to be in full transparency, I wing a few things and they never really turn out is the ones that I've really planned and put it more of that effort into. And so that's one of the things that like, as I start to think about building out my hunt schedule, as I start all these draws start to come out. I really start to like hammer in on the hunts. Which ones maybe is there a hunt that I've got a tag and I A little bit of scouting is going to go a long way. What could this hunt look like? You know, what are some potential options and backup options. And just having that going in and knowing when I'm hunting and who's going with me and really building out that hunt plan is so valuable when it comes time to get out into the field. And another thing that I want to mention, for those of you that haven't checked out outdoor class, this is a good time to dive into some of that stuff. There's a lot of awesome tips on gear getting ready. I mean, I've got my archery kind of intro to archery hunting kind of thing on there. Talks a lot about practicing with your bow and the ways that you can practice for hunting. It's all built around hunting specifically, not necessarily like teching a bow. So that's something good to check out. But there's so many other. I mean there's stuff on E Scouting, there's stuff on elk calling and other tactics that is all in that just kind of getting ready portion understanding the animal is huge. If you've got a mule deer tag into your first mule deer tag or whatever, dive into my mule deer course on outdoor class. It will be so extremely beneficial to you. And even just, you know, diving into different aspects of of different hunts, all that information can be extremely valuable. So just as a reminder, you guys can always use code livewild for a discount on outdoor class if you don't have it and you have access to not just my courses, but all the other courses out there. So something to think about. I'm gonna just say until next week. Get to planning. We'll catch you guys later.