EP314 When To Pay For A Hunting Guide & When NOT To

Should you pay for a hunting guide, or should they be avoided like the plague? There are legitimate hunting guides and there are scammers, just as in any profession. And just like anything else, there are good and bad times to pay for services. On this episode I help you understand when it is a good idea to pay for a guide and how to get the most out of the experience. 

Hunting guides and outfitters are not the same thing. An outfitter may be a hunting guide, or may supply a guide, but the outfitters’ role is much broader. They help furnish everything you need for a hunting trip from transportation to lodging, food, entertainment, gear, etc. A guide is someone who takes you into the woods, leveraging their expertise and scouting to help find you game.

Guides provide a valued service, and it’s an honorable profession. But you will always want to try and vet a potential guide before employing them. Look for reviews, contact past customers, search their name and credentials, do anything you can to verify their legitimacy, or at least check to see if serious complaints have been lodged against them.

There are two main times when getting a guide is a good use of resources.

The first is educational purposes. If you are trying to learn how to hunt something new, somewhere new, or someway new, then a guide may be the fastest way to get a crash course in how to do it right. Watch them, take mental notes, ask questions, analyze everything. Do all that you can to take in as much as possible. Your goal is to learn from a master how it is done under these circumstances.

The second big time is for unique experiences. If you have a once in a lifetime or once in a blue moon opportunity to go somewhere really fun or hunt something really unique, a guide can help you maximize the enjoyment of that opportunity. It’s not so much about learning because you aren’t planning to do it again, or often enough to be able to master it, you are just out to have fun. It is also not about taking a large set of antlers that you can show everyone you ever meet for the rest of your life and tell them how amazing of a hunter you are. You boasting about your accomplishments that are the fruit of a guide’s skills is a bit slimy, and not a great reason to get a guide.

Listen to the whole podcast episode to hear all the juicy details!

EP313 How To Win The Battle Against Ticks

Ticks are a common enemy almost all hunters face. Thankfully because of this there are numerous ways to fight them. On this episode I talk about five strategies to help you win the battle against ticks.

No one wants to encounter ticks in the woods, there isn’t a good thing to say about them. They are small sneaky blood sucking bugs that are hard to detect, and worst of all they can carry serious disease. First things first, if you get bit by a tick that has been attached for any length of time seek medical advice. If you have any symptoms of tick-borne illness, whether you have evidence of a bite or not, seek immediate medical attention. Often times tick-borne illnesses can be effectively treated if caught early. The more time that passes the harder it may be to help.

Fighting ticks happens on three major levels, chemically, materially, and visually. The first has become very popular. There are many sprays that can be used to repel ticks. Some strong tick sprays can only be sprayed onto clothing because of how harsh they are while others can be sprayed on clothing or skin. The harsher the chemicals the better things typically are at killing ticks, sometimes when they make contact with the garment. However, we are also alive and will be wearing these chemically treated garments, so I am a little bit weary of that.

The milder sprays can be used on skin and clothing work fairly well at repelling ticks, but they are not generally able to kill them on contact. However, they may be a little safer for the wearers. The main thing to consider is there are pros and cons for each approach and product. The most effective products smell strongly and are highly toxic. You need to balance this with how often you will use repellants and if you want to regularly engage with these kinds of chemicals. And there are all natural approaches and oils people use to combat ticks.

There is also tick repellant clothing. Garments that ticks cannot penetrate if they were to try and dig through them, and garments that have repellents built into the materials or are in some way treated with them. There is a lot to like about this approach but for every strong pro there is also a considerable con to be weighed as well, such as cost, longevity, and how comprehensive the protection really is. 

In this podcast episode I talk about five ways to combat ticks and stay safe while you hunt.

 

EP312 Don’t Be A Squib Load In Life

A squib is an underpowered bullet that is unable to make it out of the barrel of a gun and gets stuck partway through. Numerous things can cause it, but if its caught and dealt with promptly, a squib can be easily repaired. But if not dealt with, it can be devastating and terribly unsafe. Just like with firearms, in life there many things we can do to prevent hazardous situations and prevent them from becoming devastating when they do occur. 

Modern ammo has made squib loads very rare. But there is a growing trend of underloading rifle or handgun ammo far below its maximum potential in order to use it for hunting smaller game. This can be a reasonable practice but doing so reduces the margin of error available. If a load is under powered, it is much easier for any small things to further reduce its power and cause a squib. If something causes you to load too little powder, or you accidentally use the wrong powder, or a wrong primer is used, or perhaps a primer damaged by moisture, etc., you could more easily have a squib.

A full powered load may have enough margin to overcome some of these issues, but a lightly powered one may not. In life we have alot of people who are underpowered, not operating at their full ability and potential. They do just enough to get by, to make it through, and then when even something small happens to compromise their momentum they dip below the minimum threshold and can experience major issues like losing a job, relationship, or possession. 

They do just enough work to keep from getting fired, but then something in life throws them through a loop and their performance dips and they cross below the line and lose the job. Then they have to deal with the life issue, and the lost job, because they are operating with too little margin, with too little focus and foresight, too far below their full potential. 

Everyone will experience some challenges in life, but operating at your full ability level will provide you with momentum that enables to completely miss some challenges, while recovering faster from other. And if/when something major does come up, you can often avoid compounding it with other issues of things that were on the brink of exploding and just got pushed over the edge.

Listen to this entire podcast episode to learn about how to not be a squib in life, and how to better recover yourself when squib situations come to you.

 

EP311 Alternative Hunting Weapons | Slingshots, Air Rifles, Spears & More

Can you hunt with slingshots, air rifles, spears, primitive bows, and other alternative weapons? On this episode I dive into the efficacy of unconventional weapons to talk about what is viable, what is reasonable, and why certain things should never be used from an objective point of view. 

Slingshots are an entertaining idea when it comes to hunting weapons. They can certainly be powerful enough to kill small game. However, they have limited accuracy and there is often little margin of error when it comes to power. This weapon could be used to hunt small game in a survival situation, but I would not recommend it for hunting even if legal in your area.

The core reason is it provides limited ability to consistently and ethically kill game with minimal suffering. And that is a big deal. There is a reason we developed more advanced weapons. While possible for hunting, the slingshot is not ethical to use on game when better more ethical options are available.

Air rifles or pellet guns provide more efficacy and accuracy for hunting small game. While some of them are underpowered for anything but target practice, there are many air rifles that are capable weapons for hunting squirrels, rabbits and other small animals. These guns are both viable and reasonable for appropriately sized game at short range. They are not viable for mid-sized game with few exceptions.

There are some high end and large air rifles designed for deer hunting and throw a pellet with enough mass, speed, and expansion to kill a deer.  If you happen to have one of these and its legal in your area, then it may indeed be viable for hunting. But take no chances, it is not fair to our wildlife to use underpowered or inappropriate weapons that wound them and increase suffering needlessly. Do careful research and do not use novelties that may inflicting unnecessary suffering on animals.

Some people truly and honestly are interested in using spears for hunting deer or smaller game. The reality is, these weapons can be effective for this job, and were effective for hundreds of years.  But the other side of the equation is we invented better weaponry to replace spears because they are not effective enough to consistently and reliably kill game while minimizing suffering. Yes they are much more effective than a slingshot, but they should be avoided for all hunting except in a survival situation due to respect for the game, and the desire to get clean fast kills. 

There are many other unconventional weapons that people talk about for hunting, such as lances, knives, and yes even ninja stars. I talk about all of these in this podcast episode. 

EP310 Is Hunting High Fence Areas & Preserves Legit?

There are many establishments that promise hunters great prospects if they pay to hunt on their “preserve” or ranch, but much of the time hunters are being lured into exotic animal farms made up to sound like natural open hunting land that is protected by something other than tall fences. In this episode I talk about these kinds of situations in depth and answer a lot of questions. 

Alot has been said against hunting preserves, and high fence areas, and not all without cause. But on this podcast episode I break down this type of hunting utilizing an objective framework and what I define as the three main elements of fair chase in an attempt to provide an unbiased overview. 

Is there something morally wrong about going to preserve or high fence areas? Of course not! But at the same time, is it still considered legitimate hunting? These are the kinds of questions I tackle in this episode. 

Some people leave the impression that if the enclosure is large enough then it is very similar to open land hunting, but usually this really couldn’t be further from the truth. Often times the animals are not living in their native habitat, sometimes they are thousands of miles from anywhere they would choose to live and are simply doing the best they can in the space they have, similar in some ways to the zoo.

But even native animals are not able to establish native patterns and tendencies due to space limitations or if nothing less, artificial population density. Most of time these animals do not have 6,000 acres on which to roam. And even then, 6,000 acres only equates to about 6 square miles. Which while it sounds like a lot, is very limiting for certain types of game. 

The bottom line is fair chase is voided in these types of scenarios. Which is part of the reason why the game commission usually considers them farms instead of game lands or even private hunting lands. Which is why you often do not need to buy tags to hunt there. It’s not that much different than going to a farmer and paying them to shoot their cattle. If they animals are owned and considered property, it’s not hunting. Even if you sit and wait in a tree for an hour for the deer or elk to wake up and go to get its breakfast. 

If you are paying for each antler point or select your deer in advance from a list of named animals, that should be a fairly big clue that this is not legitimate hunting.

Sometimes guides or outfitters will secretly take hunters to these kinds of areas if public land hunts fail. Unless the hunter is very keen and aware, they may not even know they were driven to a preserve on day 5 of their hunt. The guide may well lie or work to distract the hunter from picking out key details to realize where they are.

All of that said, there are still times and places where preserves do have a legitimate function. Listen to the entire podcast episode in order hear all of the details.  

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