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We decided to do one more episode when we learned the timeline for our new show. You’ll learn the date and Nick and Mike also catch you up on what they’ve been doing over the last few weeks. Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

What a great way to end a very successful 2020/21 season. Heading into his final hunt of the year in Delaware, Nick had only seen one deer over his last five hunts this winter. He figured that streak would end by the first evening of his trip, but little did he know it would take two more days of being skunked before his luck would change. When it did though, it happened in unbelievable fashion. If you want to hear a story about how you can see almost 30 deer while hunting with a firearm and not tag one, this is it! In addition to recapping what ended up being an exciting hunt, the guys talk about the emotions involved when a season comes to an end and they share some of their personal experiences. They also share some breaking news about the future of the Red Dog Road Podcast. Spoiler alert! Some things are about to change. This is an episode you don’t want to miss. Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Ron Haas looking over some remaining sign from the 2020 season. The deer season has come and gone in most parts of the country but this happens to be the perfect time to start planning for next season. Whether it’s planning habitat projects on your hunting property or buying new gear with plenty of time to get used to it, keeping yourself busy starting now will help the 2021 season get here all that much quicker! This episode was recorded on location in Delaware with Ron Haas “Friend of the Show” while Nick is there trying to fill a couple more antlerless tags. The guys talk about the many things you can and should do to prepare for the next season, and many of them are best done immediately following the season that just closed. LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Kurt Culbert with his massive 185 4/8″ Illinois buck. You never know when your number is going to be called, but when it is, you have to be ready to perform. When Kurt Culbert was flinging arrows all summer long in his home state of North Carolina, he surely imagined what it might be like to get a shot at a big buck in Illinois, the land of giants. While he didn’t know if he’d get that opportunity, he did know he had a hunt planned for mid-November and he was going to be prepared when he got there. Kurt and his daughter after a recent waterfowl hunt together. While there’s no doubt that a little bit of luck goes a long way when chasing mature bucks with a bow, being able to seal the deal when Lady Luck comes calling is a different story. In this episode, Nick and Mike reconnect with Kurt and they relive the several key elements that went into a hunt that resulted in the buck of a lifetime being put on the ground. In fact, they retrace their steps from the very beginning before they ever met in person. Read Kurt’s personal account here on his A Hunter’s Tales blog. Kurt and his brother drag the first buck he got on the family farm without his dad there to share in the moment. In addition to talking about the magical hunt from 2010, Kurt talks about how he grew up in a hunting family on their farm in western New York, and how his passion for deer hunting hasn’t waned despite his career taking him far away from where he hunted in his youth with his dad and brothers. He also shares the deeply personal story of taking a great buck on the farm for the first time without having his dad there to share in the moment. Kurt’s outdoors upbringing and passion for the outdoors has inspired him to get his own children into hunting, and by all accounts things are off to a great start. LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Our guest, Kip Adams, doing some recent habitat work on his property. Even if you don’t own your own hunting property you still may be in a position to work on the property you hunt. Regardless, understanding the habitat you’re hunting and how deer may use it can certainly pay dividends when it comes to filling your tags. No matter what your situation is, if you’re a deer hunter there is plenty of information in this episode you will find valuable. Kip Adams, chief conservation officer of the National Deer Association, joins Nick and Mike to talk about managing land for deer, which is something he has decades of experience doing on his own property and across the country. The guys talk about what to look for if you’re interested in buying land, and then how to evaluate it and prioritize projects. One of the take home messages is good deer management doesn’t revolve around food plots like you often see on television. Kip talks about a number of things you can do to help deer simply by helping what your land is naturally producing. Nick recently took his son Will out to their land to check trail cameras, and despite only just turning four, Will loved every second of it. Also discussed on the show is how to set up your land for the best hunting opportunities and how you can manipulate the habitat each year to change the dynamic of how you hunt. Finally, the guys talk about the importance of involving family with your land management, which gives everyone a greater appreciation for the big picture of deer and wildlife conservation. This is one episode you don’t want to miss. LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Nick ended 2020 with a great late season hunt on the Back 40 with Mark Kenyon (L) and Hank Forester (M). Happy New Year friends! If you’re like us, you’re probably spending some time reflecting on a lot of things from the past year. A new year is a great time to think about the memories made in the outdoors while thinking ahead to the coming seasons and what you hope to accomplish. Nick’s doe from the Back 40 in Michigan. In this episode, Nick recaps his late season firearms doe hunt on the Back 40 property in Michigan. If you’re a follower of MeatEater, you already know the story behind the Back 40 property. If not, you can learn more here and watch the first two seasons of the show. You should also listen to this pervious episode of the Red Dog Road podcast when we were joined by Hank Forester of the National Deer Association to talk about the Field to Fork program. Nick and Mike then reflect on their 2020 adventures in the outdoors, which included even more than they realized until they started reminiscing. From the start of spring gobbler season through the peak of fishing season and eventually the archery and firearms deer seasons the guys recap what was a great year afield despite the many challenges posed by the pandemic. LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Trail cameras are a huge help in the winter months and Nick got several photos of this giant that helped him pick the perfect ambush point on a cold January morning. If you still have tags to fill and your state has a winter hunting season, don’t hang up your gear just yet. Some of the best hunting of the season can happen after most people have called it a year and if you’re not out there giving it a shot you just might be missing an opportunity to tag a buck of a lifetime, or at least add a little meat to the freezer. Nick was fortunate to finally catch up with this buck on January 15, 2016 in Ohio after pursuing him since October. Note the trail camera hanging on the tree just above the buck’s rack. In this episode, Nick and Mike talk about their history of hunting in the late or winter season, and they’ve had plenty of excitement over the years. They share stories of the good, bad, and ugly, while also providing their thoughts about what it takes to be successful when all hope seems lost. They talk about the tactics they use while also cautioning against the things to avoid, which are many. Bucks display rutting behavior well into January and calls can be effective during this time. We’ll be taking next week off for the holiday but would like to wish all of our listeners a Merry Christmas! LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Jim Sensenbrenner, the author of The Love of Hunting: Stories about a Family’s Passion for the Great Outdoors Sometimes you have to throw caution to the wind and chase your dreams. With guidance from his father, Jim Sensenbrenner fell in love with hunting. From being memorized by his father’s special leather bag filled with hunting gear to eventually taking his first deer as a youth, Jim found himself gripped by the thrill of going afield and chasing game. This eventually led him to buying his own land, which became the place where he taught his own sons to hunt while building countless memories in the process. Jim with the “Pickup Truck Buck” as described in the book. Not wanting to be pinned down by the weight and restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic, he decided to do something good with his time. He put pen to paper and began bringing many of his old hunting stories back to life, 27 of them to be exact, and the result is his latest book, The Love of Hunting: Stories about a Family’s Passion for the Great Outdoors. Jim’s trophy walls in his hunting cabin. Jim joins Nick and Mike on the show to talk about a few of the stories told in the book while also sharing his path to becoming an accomplished hunter, and how his sons are following in his footsteps. It’s a fun and heartfelt conversation you don’t want to miss. Please see below for how to get your copy of Jim’s book. Jim’s book is available for sale and the best place to purchase it is on Amazon at this link. You can also email Jim at jbsensen@gmail.com to obtain a signed copy. Nick read the book cover to cover in just a few hours and said, “I hear a lot of hunting stories just by the nature of my job, but Jim has a way of capturing your imagination and I found myself eagerly reading and not wanting the book to end.” LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

It was hard at times to have a smile on my face during the gun opener but this nice afternoon walk to meet up with Mike on a beautiful piece of public land finally did the trick. For the avid archery hunter, putting down the bow and then hauling a gun to the woods can be a difficult transition. Not only can it feel awkward and uncomfortable, the woods suddenly comes alive with more hunters and the strategy transitions from stealth to chance opportunity. The “orange army” as gun hunters are sometimes referred to is a real thing, especially in Nick and Mike’s home state of Pennsylvania, and that’s the focus of today’s show. Mike endured two gun opening days as he hunted in New York with his daughter, and then later in Pennsylvania. Nick’s opening day turned into a completely unexpected adventure during which he got his hands on a downed buck. It’s a wild and unfortunate story that pretty much put an end to his hunting for the day. For the Walk Down Red Dog Road segment, Nick recalls a time when he loved hunting with a firearm and he shares a story about a special opening day in 1997. He also talk about how times have changed since then and what he believes has caused him to lose excitement for what everyone used to refer to as “the first day of buck.” LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Find Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

Nick looked at his phone with horror when this picture came in and he was in a tree about 700 yards away. The deer walked by the spot he decided NOT to go to that evening. All good things must come to an end and that was the case this week for the Red Dog Road crew. After two consecutive shows about success in the deer woods and bagging two giant bucks, the action grinded to a halt leaving the guys wondering where the bucks they were targeting went, and they even pondered if the deer were still alive. It’s amazing how quickly things can change. Despite it being a rough week of hunting there was still plenty to talk about, including both Nick and Mike getting photos of shooter bucks while they were hunting somewhere else. Okay, one of them was actually sleeping in but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating. Cellular trail cameras can be a great tool but they can also frustrate you when you realize you’re not hunting where you should be. Mike was catching some Z’s when this New York bruiser was roaming his property. It was that kind of week. Despite the regular archery season wrapping up there’s still a lot of hunting ahead. The guys talk about their plans, which include Mike’s big plans for the New York firearms opener that he’ll share with his daughter for the first time in several years. With any luck there will be a story on next week’s show about her success. LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE Visit Nick and Mike on social media here: Mike: InstagramNick: Instagram and Twitter Music for the show courtesy of Bensound.

It’s turning out to be a heck of a season for the Red Dog Road team. Earlier this year Nick and Mike each shot two does to kick off their seasons and friend of the show, Ron Haas, also tagged a couple. Two weeks ago, Ron connected on what is likely his biggest buck to…Read More Read More

“Every hunt is an adventure,” is a common phrase for friend of the show Ron Haas. If we’re being honest though, some adventures stand out a little more than others and that was exactly the case late last week when Ron connected with an absolute giant Delaware buck. In addition to sporting a massive rack…Read More Read More

It’s late October and that means it’s a busy time in the deer woods for Nick and Mike. The guys were able to get in some hunting time this week despite initially battling with an unseasonably warm stretch and then the remnants of Hurricane Zeta, which brought almost two inches of rain. If you want…Read More Read More

It’s the most wonderful time of the year if you’re an outdoorsman and the most adventurous of us find ways to do a little bit of everything. That’s certainly true of our guest this week, Jon Lewis of Cold Front Creative and Just Hunt Club. In addition to being a talented outdoors digital content creator,…Read More Read More

It has been a busy week for the guys as we head deeper into archery deer season and the end result is an episode that they describe as a hodge-podge of topics ranging from deer to bird dogs to air guns, and a few things in between. No deer were harmed over the last week…Read More Read More

Opening day of archery season is as much about ritual and celebration as it is about filling a tag. The Pennsylvania archery season opened last Saturday and for Nick and Mike it meant finally getting back into Penn’s Woods in search of a whitetail to hang a tag on. It was a textbook perfect morning…Read More Read More

As a hunting community trying to grow our ranks, we’ve typically assumed the key to success was to target youth and get them interested in the outdoors before other interests dominate their free time. While that’s probably part of the equation, it’s likely far less significant than we always assumed. In fact, we recently learned…Read More Read More

After a long wait, the 2020-21 deer season is upon us! In what has been one of the most challenging and strangest years any of us have faced, the start of deer season is one way we can all feel a little bit closer to normal. In this episode, Nick and Mike talk about their…Read More Read More

You’ve heard about them, maybe even as far back as the 80’s, but chances are you haven’t hunted from one and are at least interested in learning more about the technique. In this episode, we talk with Josh Hillyard from the Quality Deer Management Association about his experience hunting from a tree saddle and we…Read More Read More

For some, the 2020 deer hunting season has already started and images of some really nice bucks being tagged are showing up on social media daily. Most states will be opening their seasons in the coming weeks and in this episode Nick and Mike detail their personal gear lists and the equipment they’ll be relying…Read More Read More