The Hunting Stories Podcast
Elk. Bear. Hog. Turkey. Deer and More. Hunting Stories that will make you laugh or maybe cry; real life chronicles from the field.
The Hunting Stories Podcast
Ep 135 The Hunting Stories Podcast: Donny Dust
Join us on a gripping adventure as we explore the extraordinary life and experiences of Donnie Dust, a former Marine turned wilderness survival expert. Donnie's story unfolds from his days as an infantry machine gunner and counterintelligence agent to his current passion for teaching primitive survival skills and guiding hunts. Discover how Donnie utilizes his military background and love for nature to connect people with the world around them.
Prepare to be captivated by tales from the Amazon jungle, where Donnie faced a survival challenge alongside UK adventurer Ed Stafford. Armed with only a machete, they navigated the dense jungle, overcoming its formidable wildlife and unpredictable environment, all documented for the TV program "First Man Out." From crafting tools and foraging for food to building rafts and shelters, learn about the unique challenges and exhilarating experiences of surviving in one of the world's most demanding terrains.
Venture into the heart of hunting as Donnie shares his transition from primitive bow hunting to minimalistic rifle hunts in Colorado. With intriguing stories of tracking mule deer and elk, Donnie illustrates the profound emotional and practical aspects of hunting while emphasizing respect for nature. Together with his fiancée Missy, Donnie recounts the transformative bonding experience of hunting and the timeless joy of providing for family through traditional means, weaving together past and present in an unforgettable narrative.
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Howdy folks and welcome to the hunting stories podcast. I'm your host, michael, and we've got an exciting episode for today. Today, we connect with someone who's actually a listener, but they're more than just that, and they ended up randomly being kind of a neighbor to me. But Donnie Dust. If you don't know Donnie, check out his socials and give him a follow. I've been following him for a long time because the guy is super interesting.
Speaker 1:But Donnie is a wilderness survival expert, professional tracker, former military veteran. He's known for his unique skill set and primitive survival techniques, often like teaching people how to live off the land using ancient methods. Donnie also, his work has been featured on multiple shows and he's really passionate about connecting people with nature in a way that's both practical and deeply rooted in tradition. So check him out on alone. Check him rooted in tradition. So check him out on Alone. Check him out on First man Out. Check him out on his YouTube channel. But please do give Donnie a follow. This episode is a really good one. So let's just jump into this thing. Let's let Donnie tell you some of his stories. But thank you guys, so much for tuning in. I do appreciate you All. Right, donnie, welcome to the Hunting Stories Podcast man, how are you?
Speaker 2:I'm doing exceptional. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it greatly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, I'm so excited to have you here. You followed me on Instagram and I was like no way, what's this guy doing following me? Because I've been a big fan of yours for a long time. Like I said before we started recording, like your videos were like people like can you make this? Like of course I can make, oh yeah, like you just do awesome stuff. You're a really entertaining guy and I'm honored to have you here. Um so, thank you, man. I really do appreciate it well I appreciate you greatly.
Speaker 2:I mean it like we were discussing it's. I'm I'm horrible at the, so when I I listen to podcasts and I hear different things, especially when I'm flint napping or getting ready to drive somewhere, and then I never really put two and two together. I'll follow them on, you know, the podcast, spotify or whatever the case may be, and I'm like, well, I should probably also go hit them up on Instagram as well and follow them, and so that was my fault and, ironically, we live probably less than 10 minutes from one another.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I could probably walk to your house in 15 minutes, so that is absolutely insane. But let's do this. Donnie, I want you to introduce yourself, but be as thorough or not as you want, but you are an impressive person, man. I mean you're an author. You're a Marine, you do film and movie stuff. I mean, I know you say you don't do social media, but I found you on social media so I assumed you were a little bit of an influencer. You probably don't like that title, but why don't?
Speaker 1:you introduce yourself, because I wouldn't even know where to start, because you do have an impressive background man, so go ahead.
Speaker 2:All right, well, I appreciate it. My name is Donnie Dust. That is my name, it's not a stage name or anything to that extent. Um, I live in uh, lafayette, colorado, and uh, united States Marine Corps veteran. I did uh 12 years in the Corps, served time as a infantry machine gunner and then I was a counterintelligence, human intelligence agent Uh did a lot of deployments uh to combat zones, um zones really all around the world where there is sort of kind of unique situations that required some counterintelligence work.
Speaker 2:I could find myself there and after about 12 years in the Corps it was just time to get out. You know, I had two young sons and I wanted to be, you know, present as a father and really kind of guide them into whatever kind of pursuits they, you know, wanted to explore or kind of choose on their own happenings. And after getting out of the Corps I worked a little bit of government contracts and that's kind of a unique world and it really just kind of brought me back into that, you know, that war fighting phase. So I decided to kind of pursue a lifelong passion of mine, which was kind of the primitive skills of survival, the remote living and primitive hunting. That I kind of did a lot as my, you know, in my youth and then learned quite a bit while I was in the Corps. But I wanted to do that full time and it's hard for folks to do that, to step away from you know that guaranteed paycheck and health insurance and all those things. But I think that was the Marine in me saying all right, you got this. You know you got to buckle down and and make it happen.
Speaker 2:And from that time I've written a couple of different books. I've gone on social media and that was kind of a slow phase in my evolution to where I'm at today. I never really relied on, you know, social media to promote you know a business or opportunities and I kind of started teaching skills, guiding some hunts, really by sitting at a parking lot throwing out a large bison hide or a couple of mule deer hides, doing some friction fires and kind of using my presence as my biggest advertisement. And that's where I could book people on kind of remote living experiences. And you know, when we got into that kind of hunting world I was able to kind of add some of that expertise there as well. And from that time I've been learning social media and kind of understood the importance of it and how it can present new opportunities and it's been pretty awesome.
Speaker 2:And all through this time I've been a hunter and I'm kind of I consider myself I don't want to put myself in a category because I think too many hunters do that in a lot of different landscapes. You know you're a bow hunter, rifle hunter, primitive hunter. I am a hunter and within that I kind of live by the philosophy of honoring the hunt and hunting is about resources for me and for my family. That is the hides, you see behind me.
Speaker 2:the meat, the sinew, the tendons, the intestines, the heart, liver, lungs, all of those things can be consumed. And things that come from an animal, including its bones, are all tools that I can use in the pursuits of, you know, primitive living flint knapping, building bows, building everything and anything. So hunting for me is kind of my Home Depot, king Soopers.
Speaker 1:That's cool. I like the way you think of that. I do label myself I'm a hunter of opportunity because I suck so bad at all of it. I will just go as long as I have a chance like I'm happy, whether it's rifle gun whatever. I, like you, just want to kind of harvest the animal and do the best I can. Yeah, and I'm learning it. I don't have the skills that you have by any means, but it's I love the attitude that you bring to it.
Speaker 2:Man, that's beautiful, I appreciate it and I think what what people strive for in the hunting community is a ground truth, and that ground truth is something that they obtain through successes and failures, cause you learn from both and I do believe that whether you're a 10 year hunter or five year or one year uh you know individual looking to get into hunting, you learn from those experiences and that is your ground truth and you always kind of rely on that. So I mean it even goes, you know, this Sunday I'm going out. I've taken a couple geese this year with a shotgun, waterfowl, hunting, taking plenty of ducks. But for me, I love goose meat and I also need the wings for fletchings. So it's finding those resources where I can kind of continuously fuel my adventures and my endeavors, and hunting is extremely important for me and my family.
Speaker 1:So that's amazing, man, that's amazing. And there's so many geese around here. I understand why you have taken us here so many geese around here.
Speaker 2:So good, so delicious. Do you like geese?
Speaker 1:you know, I've only so again I'm a new hunter. I've only been goose hunting one time went down in texas, to this area kind of west of houston that's supposedly just known for just amazing goose hunting. Get down there. It's the middle of the night, we're setting up our spread and I could hear geese like I've never heard geese in my life.
Speaker 1:It was just this like overwhelming noise and I'm like that's just honking. That is insane. And I've never been more excited for the sun to rise because I was like I'm going to see a goose tornado it. I've never been more excited for the sun to rise because I was like I'm going to see a goose tornado.
Speaker 1:It's going to be the best hunt of my life. Turns out, all the sandhill cranes spooked them all from our area. We had like 15 sandhill cranes above us and you could see in the distance like literally blocking out the sky, blocking out the skyline. Geese everywhere around us, but above us nothing. Just absolutely nothing, so we shot I I want to say three geese.
Speaker 1:Um, I took one home. I ate it. It was delicious, but I I don't think I did a great job cooking it. I was just excited to have the one, but it was such a funny uh, funny experience, just because I was just like so hyped and there was just so many animals but it's hunting right, you, just you can't control that.
Speaker 2:It's one of those things. Yeah, you don't get that many opportunities. Yeah, you know when opportunities when you see a flock of geese flying over and there's 100, 200, and there's multiple wedges flying, you kind of get really excited. And I think for me. I love goose meat, my boys have grown up eating goose meat. But I've discovered this new recipe where you actually take your goose breasts, put them in your crock pot, pour a full pot of black coffee, like original black coffee, and you slow cook it in that all day and it comes apart just like a pulled pork, like a pot roast.
Speaker 2:And it is it is amazing, it's absolutely no other seasonings.
Speaker 1:Salt pepper anything else.
Speaker 2:No, yeah, I mean you could. You could throw some stuff in there. I mean I'll put onions in there, some salt and pepper, but when you pull it out it just shreds and it's. It's top notch Cause before it was always like you know. You know burritos or tacos where you're covering it with just like hot seasonings, no, just black coffee, a little bit of onion, salt pepper, low and slow, that's interesting. It's top notch.
Speaker 1:Well, next time I get a goose man, that's going to that's going to be my go-to recipe so cool? Well, this isn't a cooking show, donnie. This isn't a cooking show, all right, so cut that out. Why don't you tell us how you got those geese? Let's start. No, I'm just kidding, but let's get to it, man. Why don't you set the stage? Um, where, where, where do you want to take us, man? I would love. I'm excited to hear some stories.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I think for this first story we're actually going to move out of the country and we're going to head to the Amazon jungle oh cool, yeah. So this is kind of like a little bit different, probably, than what most people hear, as well as some of their own personal experiences. Two years ago I had an opportunity to go down into the Amazon jungle and race another man by the name of Ed Stafford, who's from the UK, across the Amazon jungle with just a machete no way.
Speaker 2:That is so cool All right, it was a pretty awesome experience, but the whole objective was for him and I to race, taking different paths no maps, no compass, no water bottles, no fire, just a machete. And we were to jump into the Amazon River off a barge, swim across the river and then just hit land and then look for different indicators of elevation and then from that elevation look for, like downwater, different ravines and draws and little gullies that would lead us to this river called the Rio Negro, and that was our kind of exfil, and the first person that could get there was the first man out and they kind of won this race.
Speaker 1:Okay, so real quick. What is the estimated? Like bird flies distance from one of these rivers to the other.
Speaker 2:So we're probably looking over a hundred plus miles for this, for this leg between between the Amazon and the Rio Negro, but with with that, you know, I had never been to the Amazon jungle. Ed had an advantage where he had walked the entire length of South America. It took him two years to do it but he had kind of a ground truth there. So I've spent some time in jungles, but never the Amazon. So I was up for the challenge and I knew when we were going out there there was going to require kind of different knowledge, skills and abilities to ultimately get stuff done.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that you would think in the jungle like that, there are lots of food opportunities and there are, but a lot of them come in the form of insects or snakes, and I ate my handful of grubs and different larvae and was drinking from water vines. But one of the things that I needed was a legitimate element of protein. I needed food. You can catch piranha and you could probably try to locate a caiman. But with all those things, just like in any sort of hunting, there's certain, you know, risk, reward sort of benefits and for me I was thinking I need something that I can reach out and touch through the form of an atlatl or a bow and be able to take that, that critter, if you will, and be able to cook it over fire, whatever it is.
Speaker 2:So while I was there, I learned a couple different plants.
Speaker 2:I got to spend some time with some locals learning different plants, and one of the things that I was going to do was make a bow out of a tree called the mata mata and the mata mata is a very unique tree where that tree will provide you the right type of bow wood.
Speaker 2:Its bark will also serve as your cordage. And then, from the different palm species that are out there, there's hard tops to these palms that make pretty decent arrows, maybe like a two-and-a-half three-foot arrow, fletching-less, but it will still puncture a hole, draw blood, lead to a bleed out, so on and so forth. And one of the things that I learned quickly, what was on the menu was electric eel, and from this so I've never hunted electric eel, but being that we were there in the rainy season, a lot of the water had flooded up, and these electric eels are extremely, extremely powerful, so powerful that they can identify fruit trees, touch the base of the fruit tree if it's, you know, in the water, shock it and will drop those fruits and eat those fruits out of the water.
Speaker 2:Wow so this thing really, really packs a punch.
Speaker 1:That's amazing, so this is all news to me. You're blowing my mind.
Speaker 2:Keep going.
Speaker 1:Donnie, no worries.
Speaker 2:So as I'm traveling throughout the jungle, I'm sleeping in a variety of shelters up off the ground, I'm avoiding bullet ants and poison dart frogs, and it seems like something out of a movie and it absolutely was in my mind. But I was having a blast and eventually I got to this section where I was able to find some water and I had to craft a boat and my biggest concern was piranhas, caimans and electric eels. But prior to getting there, I was like you got to make this bow, you got to get it dialed in, you got to be able to take like a 10, 15 yard shot, maybe something in a tree or something in the water, but this is going to be your means of getting food. And having a history of bow making, I had a lot of confidence being able to make this bow with just a machete. So I find my right matamata tree, I craft my bow, my bow string. I get a couple of arrows that are fletchingless, just long heavier in the front, that tapered out and almost acts like a tail and a fletching, and you know 10, 12 yards. I was pretty dialed in.
Speaker 2:So I get to this low water and the easiest way to navigate this water is actually building a boat or a raft of some sort and then moving from flooded water to kind of dry land. Flooded water to dry land. So I built this raft out of a variety of different types of woods, built a paddle and started paddling through. And after a full day of paddling on this water I'm just completely tuckered out and it's time to make a shelter, because you can't sleep on the ground in the Amazon. You have to get up off the ground because it's a completely different sort of environment. So I build this elevated shelter, I get a fire going and as I'm doing this my fire's rocking and rolling, I start to see these ripples in the water. And when I was learning from the locals they said sometimes the ripples are caimans because they're just kind of moving high up in the water.
Speaker 2:Sometimes it can be an eel, it can be a school of piranha. But you have to be careful when you're approaching. And in my mind I'm going back to all those like hunting fundamentals of like playing the wind and kind of masking my movements from tree to tree. And as I'm doing this I'm like walking up to this water's edge, not really knowing what's in this dark, murky, like black water. But when I get there I realize that the water is mud leading up to the edge is mud leading up to the edge. So I have to kind of take a back step to where I can get to a somewhat dry portion to see actually what this is, in the event that it was an electric eel.
Speaker 2:So I moved to this dry land, I jump up onto this kind of like down tree and, lo and behold, there's this like six foot electric eel that's probably four or five inches in diameter, just slowly moving through the water. And like most you know, you know hunters you always want to be prepared. So I had my bow, I had my arrows and as I'm looking at this eel, I'm thinking to myself if I shoot this eel, I have to then get in the water with blood in the water and these eels will still kick out at charge and that can be pretty darn dangerous. So as I'm precariously maneuvering through elevated logs, I'm able to get a shot on this electric eel with my bow.
Speaker 2:It was probably like I don't know, maybe six, seven feet away, and when I shot, my first arrow missed and I was like, oh my God, this is not good, I need some food, you know. So luckily I had another arrow, drew it out and I plugged them right in the back of the head and when this thing got hit it started to kick and just go absolutely crazy in the water and eventually it died. Then it came the challenge of me retrieving this eel from the water, and it was jabbing it with sticks, trying to to lift it out, making sure that there was nothing conducting any electricity, because they can still kind of have that charge how do you know how long they can hold that charge after they expire?
Speaker 2:I believe, like once their heart stops, they have probably like another 30, 45 seconds where that charge is still kind of radiating to the muscle. It decreases in its and its you know volatility, but it's still kind of there, if you will just the idea of an animal that generates electricity is, I know it's like outer space.
Speaker 2:It doesn't make sense to me like this is insane, but okay, keep going yeah so eventually I'm able to get this eel out of the water and I'm able to pull it up on this stick. And when I finally pulled it up out of the water and I'm able to pull it up on this stick, and when I finally pulled it up out of the water, I swear it got like three feet longer. It was just this monster when I'm when I'm I'm not exaggerating Like I was able to hold chunks of meat in my hand. So we've all pulled out back straps you know elk or mule, deer or whatever the case may be and they're pretty girthy and they're pretty thick. I would say, to give you a visual, if you took four back straps from an elk and put them all together, that's how thick this electric eel was but one little yeah, one spine right down the entire thing.
Speaker 2:And um, I brought it over the fire, started chopping up with my machete, stuck it on a skewer and just roasted it over this fire ate like probably at least four or five pounds of electric eel. Tried to dry some out, um stuck some in my little uh.
Speaker 2:It wasn't the best because it's really humid there and I was kind of in this race so I just gorged as much as I could that day, stuck some over the coal, so we just kind of keep kind of roasting throughout the night, ate some more in the morning and then uh took off the you know the next morning on my raft again. But it was one of those, one of those things where, even though this was kind of a unique uh opportunity where something presented itself in the form of food um, you know it's it's, it's different than some of the conventional hunting that we might experience these days those fundamentals still remain. Like how do I retrieve my animal? What's the best way to process it? You know all those sort of factors, but it was a completely different world and completely new to me. But I was still able to kind of rely on some of the things that I knew, like all right, you know you've eaten plenty of snakes, you've eaten plenty of things.
Speaker 2:Let's break this animal down. It probably has a gut cavity, probably has an anus. You're going to have to clean these things out. Let's remove its head and if it's one giant back straps. You know swimming in the water. It's a meal and it was absolutely delicious.
Speaker 1:Absolutely yeah. So a couple of questions Are there any regulations in that area, or is just kind of like they dropped you off and they're like just stay alive, kill whatever you want?
Speaker 2:Yeah, as far as I know, there were no regulations. I don't, I mean, we weren't on anyone's property, it was just the, the Amazon jungle, yeah, so you know, catching piranha. I do believe the Caymans um might have a harvest season, but it wasn't anything that we had to consider, it was whatever presents itself. Uh, you can totally consume.
Speaker 1:So, okay, okay for me that was, that was it yeah, so that was, I assume, your big or your first big meal. Was that eel, or am I placing it kind of in the wrong in the wrong spot in the time?
Speaker 2:yeah, how many days really the, yeah, the only meal that I had. I mean there was grubs and, like Brazil, nuts and different fruits you can come across, but it's just like anyone, like some people need their peak refuels or their harvest right Freeze dried foods. I needed, you know, fuel to really energize my body. After, you know, hiking and trekking and building a boat and then paddling this boat and then having to, you know, no, I'm going to have to do a long swim once I get into the Rio Negro. Um, it's, it's kind of one of those unique adventures where food was absolutely a priority and I enjoyed it cause it allowed me to kind of stick to my, uh, my fundamentals when it comes to, you know, hunting and, and it was yeah, okay, cool, unique place, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:So who won? Uh, I did. Yeah, boy, I was hoping that was the answer, um how much? How far ahead were you of and I forgot his name already. I'm sorry, but how far, uh, yeah, how, how, how many days or hours or minutes did you finish before him?
Speaker 2:so I finished several hours before him and I think my biggest advantage was yeah, yeah, he's. He's not the best swimmer, so I got a huge leg as soon as we jumped off the barge and there was a lot of times where you could go over land, where you're along a water's edge or you could swim across, and I think that was the amphibious marine being in me. If I saw a 100, 200-meter sort of swim, I'm like I'm in the water, and if there is a caiman in there or a piranha, hopefully things will work out in my advantage. I would just, you know, I just jumped in the water and swam, you know, machete at the hand, just going just in case, but, um, I think that that really paid off and made up some time and was able to come out on top.
Speaker 1:That's so cool, okay, um, I have to assume you guys did not film this. It seems a little too intense to like, so I guess who was hosting it? Like it's a race, right? So was it just a little too intense to like, so I guess who was hosting it? Like it's a race, right? So was it just a gentleman's handshake or like what is the organization that put this all together?
Speaker 2:this was um a part of a uh a tv program and ed has raced people in various you know places, but this was like his big challenge, his big race. Reason being is I mean, he spent two years in the amazon, walking from the north of amazon all the way down to the south, so this was kind of like his coming home sort of thing. So there was a film crew there so people can actually see all of this in the flesh and in the action.
Speaker 2:It's called First man Out, but I mean, there was times where we would lose them when you're on a boat and paddling, you know, when you're running through the jungle, you know. So they would kind of leapfrog in different areas, try to catch you and see you. But we were on two different routes and the only time I saw Ed was once we got, we swam across the Amazon, when we jumped off the barge and then when we got on the Rio Negro, I could see him way back on his boat. He built a boat or a little raft as well and, uh, mine was more like a standup body board, standup paddleboard sort of thing, with like a V hole that I could use my arms and use a paddle and really get some, um, some momentum. Okay, yeah, people can watch it.
Speaker 1:That's crazy. So there was a crew and they probably had all the gear that they needed and food and all that stuff and they were just trying to keep up with it basically.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was pretty much it Like when we would hunker down for the night. They'd give you a camera and say you know, film yourself. We're going to go, you know a mile or two this way and do our thing, and you're like, all right, well, this is it.
Speaker 1:You know Cool man Very cool. Yeah, this is it, you know, cool man very cool. Good adventure. Okay, gotta last question before we go to the next story was this more difficult, or was alone more difficult for you, or were they both?
Speaker 2:kicklocks, I guess is another option you know, yeah, you know, I think alone was, I mean, alone was difficult because I got sick and that really kind of uh did me in and you, you know, unfortunately I didn't film a lot of my sickness and so I shot a muskrat with my bow, ate the muskrat, but it wasn't the muskrat that got me sick, it was a lot of the berries that animals have been peeing on and defecating on and I got a form of dysentery, kind of a similar to like a Girardia Cryptosporidium, and it just brought me down quick.
Speaker 2:But I've been sick in the woods and in the bush so many times that I know there's different plants and different things that can kind of help you out. And at this time it was just I couldn't find anything and it just kept going downhill and downhill. But they're all unique.
Speaker 1:I mean, I enjoy it alone. I bet, I bet, I bet Cool, okay, next question or not next question, but next story. What else do you got for?
Speaker 2:us.
Speaker 1:Donnie, you kind of overwhelmed me with that one, but we'll keep going, no worries.
Speaker 2:So this past year I took a nice-sized mule deer and most of my hunting is with a primitive bow. I mean, even in Colorado you can hunt with a primitive bow. You got to have your double edges with a one-inch base, some sort of you know, steel kind of broadhead. So most of my arrows that is about as primitive as I can get them, still meeting state regs for archery. And this year I was trying to transition into the idea of saying, all right, you need more meat. Um, you got two teenage sons, um, you eat a lot of meat, you need some more meat. So let's go out there and let's do a rifle hunt, but let's take away all of the advantages that you can that you can have in a rifle hunt, meaning, uh, no food.
Speaker 2:I'm not a food guy when it comes to that, um, minimal clothing, like, uh, you know you're not bringing a lot of packs and supplies, you're bringing the bare bones stuff You're going to give yourself. Uh, I brought five rounds and I I was thinking of bringing more, just the idea, you know, just to make sure everything is down if that's the case. But I was like, five rounds, you know what you're doing and I wasn't going to take a shot that was over 100 yards out. I just kind of like to give myself a little bit of a challenge to make sure that I'm enjoying this fun for everything that it is. Yeah, so I was shooting a 7-mag rifle and it's a great rifle for elk, mule deer, whatever the case may be and I went out to unit uh, this was 51 along the front side and I'd spent a lot of time in this unit. There's a lot of caves out there and I was sleeping in those and that very first day we got a bunch of snow and, like most hunters, when it's mule deer season or even elk season, that snow is a good indicator of recent habits. Through track, through, through ground spore, you name it. It gives you an opportunity to kind of learn a quick history of that area. So some snow fell and I'm cutting tracks left and right over all these different areas and I couldn't pick up any tracks. Lots of fox, a couple of mountain yotes, some pine martin, things to that extent, but I wasn't finding any mule deer.
Speaker 2:And unit 51 is kind of a unique unit, so it's it's Douglas County, colorado, up to like Sedalia, and then there's a small chunk of it that sticks out towards West Creek Colorado and if anybody knows anything about West Creek Colorado is that probably about seven or eight years ago there was a fire that swept through there and I love hunting, burn scars, burn scars. In my personal opinion, if you've got a unit where you can get on a burn scar, there's a lot of fresh growth. It's relatively young. You've got good visibility all around you. You'll find these clumps of trees and these areas where animals could bed down that are somewhat isolated, so you almost reduce a lot of that kind of foliage that could get your way and you got good line of sight.
Speaker 2:So I spent a couple days, two days, up in the mountains and then I was like you know what, let's go down to that burn scar. So I headed west from like Rampart Range Road and went to just behind west creek and I had spent some time out in west creek prior to that uh, fire kicking off and I helped a gentleman out there trap a bunch of coyotes that were tearing up his, his rabbits and his chickens. So I had a little bit of ground truth familiarity with it. But what I needed to do was get out and scout it because I hadn't scouted that area so while I'm hunting, um, I just kind of said, all right, leave your rifle one day. You just got to get eyes on some animals.
Speaker 2:And where I was situationally if you think about a north to south running hard ridge and a hard ridge is something where it's kind of comes from a bowl and then sweeps up high and hard and it's almost like the spine on the back of like a dinosaur or like certain sort of reptiles yeah and hunting a spine like that, especially a north-south running spine, gives you a lot of advantages and those advantages are one you can play the sun and two kind of in those burn scars.
Speaker 2:You have a pretty consistent wind coming from west to east. So I knew I was south of that spine. I had to make my way north of it and then jump on the other side of the spine and get an opportunity to do some glassing to just get eyes on and see what I could come across. So I spent one whole day doing that, woke up super early in the morning because as soon as you cross that plane right, so if the spine's running north, south, south north, I'm gonna have to walk in front of it. I can't necessarily walk behind it because eventually I was encroaching onto some private property. So I'm like I'm gonna have to punch out at 3, 3.30 in the morning, shoot out there, get to the far side of it, jump across that spine and then, when all those animals start moving that 4.30, 5 o'clock, waiting for that sun to come up, I can use that spine as a method of masking to see where these populations are, where they're bedding out of, where they're moving throughout the day where they're feeding and I can use that knowledge to ultimately see what animals present themselves. So I did that for that third day, moved through that whole spine, saw lots of does, saw lots of little yearlings, saw a couple spikes, and then every once in a while I'd see like a nice big buck kind of chasing down a couple does. But they're all on the run, all on the foot, so I'm thinking something's spooking them. It's still's. It's still the rut, tail end of the rut. Are these these older guys that are kind of trying to chase down these ladies? But I'm like, for me it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:My tag was, uh, an antlered, um, an antlered mule deer and uh. So I spent the day kind of looking and looking and I didn't see anything that would really meet the criteria. It met my criteria as kind of just meat in the freezer and, like I always say, you can't eat antlers. But I use the antlers for foot napping tools. So I'm like, all right, you're going to repeat the same action tomorrow and you're going to bring your rifle and you're going to get out there and you can ultimately see better. You'll have your scope the whole nine yards. So I did that same exact thing and ultimately see better, you'll have your scope the whole nine yards. So I did that same exact thing, but in my process I really paid close attention to where I was walking and exactly where I was going.
Speaker 2:More importantly, the wind. The wind was hard. It was blowing on my left side as I was walking north, and one of the things that I carry with me is a little wind gauge. I don't know why I didn't bring it. It's probably in my truck. I assume a primitive one and not just like a puffer bottle of baby powder. Okay, exactly, yeah, this one's actually from Africa and I learned this from a tribe member out there that was considered a poacher, then released by the government because he's so good at hunting and tracking. The guy's between 70 and 80 years old. He's just a phenomenal hunter and tracker, and when I spent some time out there, he gave me this wind gauge and it's just this little plume of feathers. So when you're shooting your bow and you draw your bow, you always have that wind in consideration. More importantly, I don't have to pull anything out of my pack. Do a little puffer.
Speaker 2:I can just kind of throw my hand up and situate my body and see where that wind is. So it's just a constant wind gauge, because I'm worried about wind for me, not from thee, because if they're upwind, whatever. Yeah, so I have this wind gauge and I'm really paying close attention, because sometimes in the mountains wind will blow the kind of that west to east but it will hit a unique sort of terrain feature like a mountain that's kind of in a bowl, and it will start to swirl it and that becomes a problem. I didn't see or feel any of that when the day before and I was just making sure that I wasn't going to kind of experience it today or that day. So I get to my hard line and I jump across this ridge. Sun's coming up right, so I always like the sun at my back. Even though animals have phenomenal perception of of of sun and heat and wind and all these things, it still gives me my mental advantage where I think, like you know, if you've ever been like overseas fighting terrorists, they always like to have the sun at their back. So if you got to turn and shoot at them, you got the sun in your eyes. Yeah, kind of that same mentality. So I've got the sun at my back and I'm just working this ridge and I just start seeing five or six does and a couple young ones and then you know a spike or a fork kind of walking through and I'm mentally in my head saying, all right, this is what you're out here for, you're out here for me, you're out here for, you know, meeting your limit, let's get it done.
Speaker 2:So in that ridge I looked for different windows. That would be a great kind of egress down, and the egress down is just as important as your walk out to where you're going, because that egress down is your point of exposure where you're not necessarily going to silhouette yourself but you're going to use the terrain to mask your movement, to get within kind of that ideal shot. So I'd identified all my egress points and I know my third egress point was my best point. So in my mind I stay behind the ridge and I move to that third egress point and see what presents itself, and I did just that. So I knew that that population of does was going to make their way kind of down this draw and there was some hard terrain at the kind of southern edge of the spine and if I could get there. It was probably a great spot to take a shot. So I moved along this edge and this is where the kid in me comes out, cause I can tell you there's probably five or six times where I'd walk right up to that edge and I kind of peek over. Yup, they're still there and peek down. Every time I'm doing that there's a possibility of exposure.
Speaker 2:Because animals watch ridges. I love it. They watch for the yeah of exposure. Because animals watch ridges I love it. They watch for the yeah. Every, everything watches for silhouettes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's trying to stay alive, I just exactly, you know.
Speaker 2:So I make my way down to that um, egress point and soon as I kind of round this kind of like rocky sort of ledge, there are four or five, just bucks, just kind of wait, just some dudes hanging out and I'm like holy cow, okay, this is, this is where you want to be. But I was still out of my, my range, and I don't have, you know, a lot of tools out there with me to kind of. So I'm doing that range estimation. A hundred football yard, that's kind of my, uh, my go-to Quick question there.
Speaker 1:I know you said you wanted to shoot within a hundred yards I assume you're proficient outside of 100 but in this case you just weren't at the spot. That you felt was sporting enough for you to do what you wanted to do, right correct.
Speaker 2:I think I was probably like, uh, right around like 300 yards at that point, which, which is still a fine shot. But I think for me, always hunting with that primitive bow, I like that just that little, because with a primitive bow to get on those mule deer, you're, you're, I mean 12 yards, is like most ideal. It's, it's a hard stock, but it's, it's a juice, is worth the squeeze. I guess you could say, yeah. So I hit that 30 grass and as I'm coming through a little bit of rocks, they get a little bit of head turnings towards me. They're watching I freeze and they're like this guy's obviously, and you know I've got blaze orange on in my vest and it's still in my mind. I'm like they can see me and I know there's, you know that, that mentality of like the whole blaze orange. But, um, but they kind of start to move over and they kind of jumped to the other side of this little finger, cause it's kind of multiple fingers going down. I'm like that's perfect, wind's still in my favor. Now I can push a little bit harder, a little bit quieter, and I can get to that next finger, that little ridge, and I can see where I'm at, make my way down, get to that ridge. There's small little pockets of snow and I think when I hunt it's kind of like a rock hopping sort of thing Less sound, less movements. Snow's a crunch, leaves are a crunch Burn scar. You got open terrain but they also have that visibility.
Speaker 2:I get to that top of that ridge and those three or four bucks, um, were kind of just down below starting to make their way up there, uh, up that other side of that ridge. At that point I knew I was in with that, uh, within that a hundred yards, and uh, I kind of just got myself in like a good, like high kneeling position, gave that like like one of those where they're all kind of stopped, turn, and then took this nice buck and, um, he, I mean with the seven mag, within a hundred yards, he went down like instantly. Um, I mean, yeah, I mean it was a lot of firepower, but yeah, that's what you got. The rest took off. And at that point, you know, waited my time, waited for him to finish out I already knew he was finished out Walked over there and really started to process him out.
Speaker 2:And part of that disadvantage I wanted to create for myself because, you know, I, I, creating hard opportunities always kind of gives you a different award is? You know, I had some stone knives that I was going to gut and process it, and when I shoot a deer, everything's coming back, and that is intestines, that is stomach, that's heart, liver, lungs, the hide. I mean I've got a bucket of legs over there full of sinew, like everything on. That thing is a resource. And I've got a small little pack. I little pack, I don't. I mean kafaro sent me a nice pack. After they heard about this story. They're like we need to help you out.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh my, god, I feel so embarrassed like no, just please, this is, this is our gift.
Speaker 1:I'm like okay, so I had this small little pack and um how far back are you if, when you shot this, six miles, six miles, okay, okay, yeah, and you're bringing everything. Six miles, six miles, okay, okay, yeah, and you're bringing everything out, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, six miles, three trips to pack it all out. The only thing that really didn't come with me was a small chunk of the large intestine, all the stomach contents, and then a big chunk of the lungs where I wound up shooting the muley. Yeah. But so take it all apart, and part of my process when I'm taking an animal apart is its hide. Is the cleanest thing out there, yeah. So I take that hide off totally kind of pin it out onto the ground and that's where I start pulling out my quarters, the backstrap, the hearts, all my consumables that I'm looking to eat neck meat, the whole nine yards and the head is still attached to that. And I wrap all that up and, um, well, I kind of first off, like like most hunters, you're like I think I could carry this thing out.
Speaker 2:And there was no way I was able to carry this guy. I mean, I tried, like every combat drag, I tried splitting legs and shoving them through to create a backpack. I was just too tired and so low on fuel that it was just it was no go. But I was thinking to myself all right, so you know how far you got to walk back in, walk back out. You're going to have to grab everything and anything, so it's going to take you some time Just get it done. So took a couple quarters, took the heart liver, did my first track out, walked back out, did that three times over six miles with a little bit of jog.
Speaker 1:Six each way, so 12 miles per trip.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a lot. I want to be honest with you. It was one of those things where it took pretty much all day. But the beautiful thing was most of it was kind of gradual train leading up to where my actual truck was, and then it was easy to actually get back down.
Speaker 2:Like when you have that good line of sight, like you can find that most optimal. I'm not really dodging and trees, it was just kind of like in and then it was kind of out and six miles. I could be exaggerating. It was, it was, I would say six miles it was probably just under six miles each way man.
Speaker 2:But, uh, it was, uh, it was worth it. I finished out the last hall, got back to my truck and pretty much like just collapsed of just you know, pure exhaustion, just like this is this is exactly what I wanted, how I wanted it, but, um, it was, it was just top notch. And I think for me, uh, being able to come home with everything I mean I have the hide sitting over here, the skull I boiled out my you know myself. I sit there with dental picks, pick everything butchered, all my own meat. Um, but for me at that time, just like in any sort of hunting, you know story and experience, it was about food for the family, resources for me to have that I continue to use.
Speaker 2:And just like most hunters, you know I get emotional in that process. You know you nobody likes to kill anything but, like, I appreciate everything that that animal has given me from the day that you know I started to, you know, work in and get those opportunities to hunt, you know, different animals to where it's at now, like I've got some more of its backstrap I'm eating tonight for dinner. It's those sorts of things that really make for me the story even more beneficial because, yes, there is that, that hunt, but now the story continues with its hide and its bones and cracking its long leg bones to eat the raw marrow out of and its antlers will become flint knapping tools and knives handles. So it's kind of a beautiful story and I love it.
Speaker 1:I enjoy it, man, I love it. I love all sorts of different things about that story from um, just like your dedication to doing it your way. I love the details that you remember. I know a lot of guys that don't tell stories all that great. They're just like yeah, I walked in and I shot this deer, like every single thing you can remember the topography.
Speaker 1:You remember the different points of access. Like I love it when people can remember those kinds of details. That that was a great story, man, Thank you. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2:Thank you, that was fun and uh.
Speaker 1:I can, I can feel the pack out uh the way that you explained it.
Speaker 2:I was smoked, I had blood dreads, as I call them, cause I got long hair. They were just caked in blood and just dreaded up and um, I think at the very end I recorded a little video like last fall out, and I I just called it honoring the hunt Like you gotta, you gotta work for it, you gotta want it. Like I don't have ATVs or horses or anything to that extent, but I'm strongly considering buying one. But, um, and then you know, I've got.
Speaker 2:I've got one other story, because that was in November and about nine days later, the gal that I'm marrying, missy, this was her first elk hunt and she had pulled an antlerless elk. I also had an antlerless elk tag, but I said, hey, let's focus on getting you an animal, let's focus on you getting out there hunting. And this was in Unit 58, right in front of Mount Antero, between Buena Vista and Salida, okay, and it's kind of a populated unit, and I learned what Onyx was. So I've never hunted with any of this stuff before in the past. I still like maps, I still like scouting, but she had Onyx and she's like you should get onyx and I was like this is absolutely amazing.
Speaker 2:Like I had I mean, I knew I had heard of it but I never really knew its full capabilities. Yeah, so her and I we loaded out in the truck and, um, she has, you know, archery elk hunted, uh, before in the past, but this was going to be her first go around with a rifle. So we head up to the snowy area, kind of sitting right in front of Mount Antero, and I say, as soon as we get there, we're going to walk. And now that I know about Onyx, because I felt like I was cool, we can walk right up to these kind of private property lines. We won't infringe on those, but it's a good area because elk like to move in and out and we're going to use that to our advantage.
Speaker 2:So we spent a day walking in the snow and then while we were walking we just noticed and she kind of brought this to my attention that there was a lot of cars moving along this kind of North South road and they were glassing down these fingers. And I think it was a really awesome experience for me and for her because I was able to kind of give her a little bit of. You know, there's hunting and then there's shooting and I just explained to her like everybody has different capabilities and limitations. But for you to kind of continue to honor that hunt, you have to get out and walk Like glassing from a road in your truck with the heater on, looking for any sign or any sort of indication, and then getting out and putting on your stalk. It's a way. It's not necessarily the way, but that's not how I hunt and that's not how she wants to hunt.
Speaker 2:So we spent two days there walking these different fingers and unfortunately, when there's pine nuts on trees I usually get distracted, start eating pine nuts. But it's also a food indicator. Didn't really see any track, didn't really see anything. And we jumped down onto the main road and she found this little insert that connected to some BLM land and it was a hard kind of road and we drove up there and we parked and I said let's get out, let's walk. We're looking for ground spore, elevated midpoint and then lower level ground spore, anything that will give us indications. Uh, that elk are in this area. Uh, we had binos this time, which was kind of cool. We had a laser range finder, we had onyx I'm like this is this, is this is amazing.
Speaker 2:But it was, uh, it was exciting to use those tools because this was her hunt and you know, with my tag I was like focus is you? And after we had moved to that area I said, well, what we're going to do is we're going to hunker down near the truck it's kind of hot and we're going to play kind of the north-south sides where animals are going to be sitting in snow avoiding the heat, and we're going to kind of let it get to about maybe like 12, one o'clock when that sun is really shifted, and we're going to use that sun, that terrain, kind of to our advantage. More importantly, I want to see the elk moving through that snow. It's a good contrast, as sure as anything, I'd say. Probably about 45 minutes after us, sitting on this ridge, we see four or five elk.
Speaker 2:Now, hers was antlerless and we see it, it's about 800 yards. Actually, hers was antlerless and we see it, it's about 800 yards. Actually it was 836 yards, because that time we had a laser, the range finder, but yeah, I'm not complaining about technology, but it was like oh man, that's okay, that's pretty cool, that's convenient. Yeah, totally convenient, totally convenient. So I'm like, all right, let's put this stock on the convenient, totally convenient. So I'm like, all right, let's put this stock on. The wind was blowing kind of from the southwest so it was kind of blowing in our faces and we had about seven or eight kind of draws and fingers we had to move between until I kind of spotted this one ridge that would give us an advantage. So, as I was explaining to her, we want to avoid the roller coaster, we kind of want to do the bumper cars where you're kind of walking at the basis, which requires a little bit more energy expenditure. But I'm like avoiding silhouettes is like a huge thing.
Speaker 1:So we wind up making our way. I'm going to use that. By the way, I'm going to use the bumper cars analogy, like no roller coasters we're going bumper cars, that's it, that's it.
Speaker 2:So we get to the backside of this one kind of draw and this little finger and we're at, like I recall I think it was like 130 yards, like significant hunt in this sort of capacity, and I can, I can, I can see her. I can see her emotional state slowly changing into I'm about to take the life of this animal. I'm about to kind of experience something that not a lot of people get to experience. Those that choose to, we'll find a way to do it. But this is something pretty sacred, something pretty honorable. And you know she has a seven mag. So she kind of takes a high knee, she's sitting in a little bit of chunk of snow and there's four elk, four antlerless elk, one's laying down in the snow and then there's one kind of standing on the high point of the ridge and then two kind of off to the side and I'm like I want you to think which one is the most you know advantageous to take. And she's like I think the one laying down. I said perfect Animals that lay down. All that stuff is kind of compressed and kind of compartmentalized in a little bit tighter thoracic cavity. She takes her shot kind of blows her back a little bit, yelk instantly kind of it doesn't get up. I see a big spurt of blood as it comes out of its mouth kind of, kicks once or twice and lays down and at that point, you know, she came to tears and I was kind of in a you know tearful sort of spot because it was something we got to share together and she suddenly understood and I think she kind of already knew, the importance of hunting to me and for a lot of men and women out there were one, that experience and two, now what you know ultimately comes after, but all of the rewards, the, the food in the, the hides, like she was now part of that living history, cause you know, everyone in this in this world, from you know 10,000 to 10 million, you know 3.3 million years ago, are hunters. And she now got to experience that in a different capacity but now is going to really truly understand what it is.
Speaker 2:And we walked over to that elk, dragged it down the side. Thank God it was in snow, because what it was? It was like a little button buck or a button bull, so it was still antlerless but it was a young male and I quickly got really nervous because as we pulled it down and she kind of took a moment to put, you know, put her hand on it, and anything I do in hunting I always do like a last rites of food sort of ceremony, where I take whatever it's eating and I place it in its mouth as its last meal. So it consumes Now, we consume it. It's kind of that full circle, just to kind of show that appreciation. And as I was doing that, I kind of looked and I kind of saw these two kind of you know, testicles that didn't quite fully drop and I'm like what the heck? And I didn't realize, you know, from that distance, that it was a young male, felt up on his head just two tiny little nubs, which is a great thing, and it's also, you know, a bad thing because you want, you know, animals to kind of be able to grow and mature and do their thing, uh, still meeting all those legal limits. But it was a larger, antlered, less animal.
Speaker 2:So, um, we started and for you know, you know, missy, she's 105 pounds, soaking wet. She got to work, you know, gotten the animal out and quartering it and just pulling everything off of this animal and then our walk back, uh, to the truck. Um, you know we did two trips and it was just like around two miles a mile and three quarters was our, our, our total after we kind of walked in and out. But, um, she was, she was super excited for the experience and the most beautiful part about it was once we actually came home, um pulled out the fleshing beam and the butchering tables and she cut that animal up into steaks and just roasts and stews. Everything mean we still have bones sitting in the freezer that we use for bone broth and um, but everything she got to experience the hunting that you know I've learned to really appreciate over the years. She kind of got to see it firsthand and really had an opportunity and her, her brother, jt, runs a Delta waterfowl down in Texas. So she was absolutely sending him texts right off the bat like have you got an elk? You know that sort of thing. But it was an amazing experience to share with her because you know we are getting married here in the future. She loves hunting, she's from Texas but she's been able.
Speaker 2:I was, I was appreciative of her willingness to kind of go the path that I like to choose but still incorporating, um, some of the the conveniences of, uh you know, for achieving that level of success. But I'll tell you what for 105 pounds she packed out quarters, hearts, livers, I mean she, she put in the work and it's uh, yeah, you know, post-holing through some snow and get where we need to go. But, um, yeah, that night we kind of, uh, we stayed back out on that ridge, kind of enjoyed the stars and the night and then all the hard work that was going to come in the next couple of days. But once we got back, I'd say within, oh God, I think within three days, hide was flushed and stretched, all the meat was processed Meat's always first, but got all the meat done. Then we'd go to the hide and then we boil out the skull and I start making tools out of anything and anything that's left behind.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I think for us, on the grand scheme, it was just a, it was a great, it was a great bonding experience. So, for all you husbands out there and all you ladies that are listening, go hunting with your partner, with your significant one, your lover, because it is a amazing thing to have that story of going out and truly like obtaining and then providing for your family.
Speaker 1:It's absolutely rewarding, that's so cool man so she's hooked I assume, so she's going every year. Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:And that's the funny part is like I don't. I've never done an elk camp. I've never done a mule deer camp. I've always been like a, a solo hunter. I've had a handful of people on standby that I could call if I needed help packing something out, if I didn't think I could do it. But I've never been to an elk camp where there's coolers and four wheelers and you know breakfast is being cooked, it's, it's. It's never been my um one. I've never been invited to. It's never been my thing and there's not. There's nothing wrong with that. But I just I like the, the soloness of the hunting.
Speaker 1:I mean.
Speaker 2:I'll go hog hunting with, with people in different capacities, and waterfowl hunting, but when it comes to like elk or mule deer or you know, mountain lion hunting or anything in that sort of capacity, I like that soleness. But this was really that first time I got to share it with somebody and it's it's even better than I got to share with someone that I love and going to wind up marrying.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, that is so awesome.
Speaker 2:Right on, donnie. I wish we had like six hours, because I feel like I could just keep hearing stories.
Speaker 1:Man, I've got like a million questions. Fire away, let's see the tech. It was just a nice convenience at the time, or are you going to adopt any of those things moving forward?
Speaker 2:You know I think that's a great question I still have the Onyx app on my phone, Uh-oh.
Speaker 1:Uh-oh, I still have the Onyx app on my phone.
Speaker 2:I know, I know Well it's so I'll tell you what I think I'm going to use it for a lot of that scouting, a lot of that initial planning as far as understanding, you know private properties, blm, national Force, all that sort of stuff, and I think I will. I think I'll adopt it at certain ways in certain times. I think if I'm going with a primitive bow I'll probably drop the Onyx, go back to my, you know, moccasins, loincloth, you know that's just, that's just me.
Speaker 2:But I think if we're, if we're going in a different capacity somewhere else, I think Onyx is a great tool. I think it will help build the confidence of hunters and their uncertainties of of terrain and understanding you know how far they did walk or what. What are some of those factors in there?
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:I'm, I'm all for it.
Speaker 1:Okay, Very cool. Um, you mentioned cougars. You don't strike me as a having a bunch of dogs, so do you just? You just go cut tracks and just start following them. I do, how do you okay?
Speaker 2:Snow, I wait for the snow, I wait for that. I call up, just like you know. Hey, whatever unit, uh, five lines available and uh, I haven't had any success with that. Um, but there has been a handful of times. This is when I was kind of living in Southern Colorado where I just I just look for tracks, shooting across the road, prominent trails, and I've been able to see lions definitely not within a shot, but it's cool and I think I've learned so much from it. But when that fresh snow is hitting, that's the most opportune time. Cut those tracks, see where they're going, see if they're circling, you know, because lions they breed year-round, so there's always something there that you know they going for food or you know that that partner and um, I think that's just. I mean, if you can get eyes on a lion after cutting tracks and following it for an hour or two, that's, that's rewarding.
Speaker 1:I mean it's hunting within itself about the uh, you know the benefits, but I believe it for some buddies that have taken lions. That's the way to do it really okay, so do so, do you go with your, you know like bow.
Speaker 2:You go with a bow, yeah.
Speaker 1:You are a crazy man, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:Well, I think I mean, if hunting with rifles and there's success, I feel like for me my success rate goes up, with a rifle my success rate goes down, just like most archery hunters, it goes down. And then I think when you bring it down to a primitive bow, you have to employ a whole different set of different skills, knowledge, skills and abilities to get that shot. And I've taken elk with a bow and mule deer with a bow and all sorts of things with a bow. But I mean that's the challenge. This year I was looking for something a little bit different with Marissa. I was looking for a a little bit different with you know, with Marissa I was looking for a little bit something different with myself because it was, it was about those resources.
Speaker 2:But years in the past, I mean, I tell you what I love. Yeah, I love, I love archery hunting, especially with a, you know, a six foot primitive bow that draws at 65 to 70 pounds. You've made your arrows, you know that thing is dialed in and there's nothing wrong with you know, compound, uh, hunting, um, you know, pick, pick your poisons. That's just how I enjoy, good for you, uh, doing it yeah, it's good for you.
Speaker 1:I I can't imagine sneaking up dude you said like 10, 15 yards on a cougar that's not treed with a stick bow like whoo, okay, that got me fired up.
Speaker 2:I haven't gotten there. Yeah, you'll get there. I'm rooting for you. I'm rooting for you. I got one more question.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm worried that it's going to just like open up this crazy story that you have to tell. All right, you obviously have a very unique style of hunting. Like, you're in the top 1% of like. I'm going to do it the way that our ancestors did it. Yeah, have you ever been on a hunt where you're like maybe I pushed it too far?
Speaker 1:Like, like, maybe maybe I shouldn't have gone just like like you know, like you're like man, I wish I had a better jacket or I wish, I like, whatever the circumstance with any of the things that you kind of dial back on is has there been. I'm sure plenty of instances and and I don't know. Is there one that stands out that you could share with us? Yeah, I mean all of them.
Speaker 2:I'm always thinking every time you're an idiot but I I. So one of the reasons I love uh, you know, and I'll, I'll keep it short archery hunting, primitive bow, especially in Colorado. Our bow season is typically around September, right, and the season that starts right before that I love hunting is marmot whistle pigs. Way up in elevation, you know, 12, 13,000 feet, whistle pigs is the perfect thoracic cavity size of an elk, so it's great to get dialed in on those.
Speaker 1:They taste delicious. Oh, interesting and for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, if you have a marmot hunted, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1:Never even thought about it.
Speaker 2:Oh man, it starts August 10th, typically 9th, 10th, 11th and then ends the end of October when the mountains start getting heavy snow. That's usually when they den up, but it starts Now. During that season you're getting dialed in on marmot and you're way up in elevation so you're really pushing yourself. But I like to have the marmot hunt overlap with that kind of fall time, turkey and then into that elk season because it is opportunities for meals, especially the marmot. And uh, there's been countless times where I've been you know it's archery season mule deer elk, whatever that case may be, and um, I'm still be hunting for those.
Speaker 2:But I'm hunting for marmot because I want an aspect of food. You know a marmot looks like a big groundhog but they're clean eaters. They eat a lot of moss and flowers and grasses so they're not really digging in the dirt eating up worms and grubs and crickets and stuff. It's higher elevation worms and grubs and crickets and stuff, it's higher elevation. So where I kick myself is like you need to start bringing some supplementals where you can focus more on the mule deer elk hunt and not focus on getting a marmot that you're going to burn 8,000 calories trying to get.
Speaker 2:Shoot it, cook it get maybe 1,500 calories, and then you're kind of back at square one, so that sort of thing, having some of those modern things just being able to take a form of fuel, and that other fuel comes in the form of fishing. But if you're trying to hunt meals, while you're trying to hunt your primary target eventually hunting all of those meals catching fish, marmot, squirrels, whatever that eventually becomes your priority and you're missing out on your opportunities to hunt, so supplemental food, and then you know I'm a big, I'm a big fan, especially, you know, august. Into September. Mountains are still beautiful, it's still warm in my opinion.
Speaker 2:So it's absolutely great, but just bringing some amenities to aid in your sleep, instead of sleeping in like a big leaf bed or just having a wool blanket or you know why not, you know, bring a sleeping bag. I mean, no one's going to judge you, it's just one of those things where it's a little little comfort.
Speaker 1:Come on, donnie.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you wonder why I've never been invited to an out camp.
Speaker 1:Yeah Right, they're like why doesn't Danny? Donnie bring a tent or a sleeping bag. He's just sleeping in the yard, I know it's, it's, it's, that thing.
Speaker 2:But I think you know, I'm 45, maybe, as time progresses and maybe I'll, you know, incorporate a lot more of those amenities with with Marissa Missy. Um, this, this go around, I had some of those modern amenities and I could see why there is a draw and the advantages they provide. Uh, successes as well as failures. Um, I'm gonna, I'm gonna continue doing what I'm doing. I mean, you know, putting our tags in is is right around the corner in my personal mind. Um, so I mean, this year, all we've already decided we're both doing archery. Now she can't draw fully on a primitive bow, she, so she shoots a compound bow. So she's still working up to be able to draw on a primitive bow, something around that 50 plus, still getting within a good yardage. I mean, she can meet all the state regs. But she really wants to hunt with that primitive bow and I'm like, well, let's just work your compound until we can get where you need to go, but she puts in the arrows, without a doubt.
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 2:This year we'll wind up putting in our archery tags and we'll roll right from marmot to turkey and then right into that elk. But I will have some refueled meals, because there's a thing called a harvest right. I'm not sure if you're familiar with it, but it's a commercial freeze dryer where you can get one at home. Okay, so you can take all of your meals, of your meals that you uh, you know you make a large portion of it. You have some leftovers. You can actually freeze dry and turn it into your peak refuel.
Speaker 1:I've heard of people doing that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and I'll tell you what it's. Um, I learned about it from a guy named Sean Curtis up in Wyoming. He's a phenomenal and I kept seeing him eating. He's like I'm having elk, you know, like fajitas, and I'm like it's June, like what the heck? How do you still have some? You know, he's kind of going over how he did it. So he kind of got me interested and Missy got interested. So now we have a lot of those meals that you know don't cost you 15 bucks a pot but you can make your own sort of stuff. So, incorporating meals, incorporating some sleeping gear and I don't know, maybe I'll keep Onyx on the phone for a little while longer, All right Well.
Speaker 2:I was just curious man.
Speaker 1:Don't change because of me, I just love what you do, man, I've always been impressed. I'm running out of time here, but I want to have you back on again sometime soon, donnie. Absolutely, but I want to have you back on again sometime soon, donnie. In fact, I'm thinking about getting a group of guys locally to do something in person. So, yeah, I'll get you involved with that. But let's do this, let's wrap this up.
Speaker 1:Wanted to tell the folks where they can find you if you want them to find you. If not, you can just run off without your sleeping bag into the mountains. It's up to you.
Speaker 2:Like I tell most people, you can find me in the mountains or in the woods, somewhere like that. But yeah, on most of the social media it's just Donnie Dust, d-o-n-n-y-d-u-s-t. On my YouTube, where I go over a lot of prim skills and survival sort of stuff. It's Donnie Dust Paleo Tracks, all my books, all the things that I make and different things that I sell. All you have to do is go to DonnieDustcom and that is really your hub for anything you want to learn or even just getting in contact with me. And I do want to stress to folks that I respond personally. I don't have a team of people, it's just me. So if you send an email, you're getting me and, more importantly, if you leave comments in any videos or anything to that point, I try to personally extend some of my time to sharing with you. I don't like the mentality of posting and ghosting. That is not how you build a community and for me it is about reaching out to people, connecting, making new friends and relationships. Hell yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah, don't be a stranger, Reach out. I'm happy to answer questions and you know, shoot the shit.
Speaker 1:So to speak. That's awesome, man.
Speaker 2:That's awesome Well, donnie thank you so much, man.
Speaker 1:You've. You've always been like my, my pie in the sky dream of like where I want to get to, so it's super cool to get to meet you as a newer hunter, like you see guys like yourself and it's just like oh my gosh, I wish so no, thank you.
Speaker 2:Well, you do you, man? I mean, that's the easiest thing to be just keep rocking and rolling. Well, I have a feeling we're gonna wind up getting together sooner than later. We live less than 10 minutes apart and, uh, we'll get out there, we'll see what we can come up with, and uh, we'll get some meat in the freezer.
Speaker 1:That's what it's's about oh yeah, I'll have you over. So I shot a moose this year, so I'll have you over and we'll, we'll, cook up some moose, oh shit, yes, sir oh man, that's awesome yeah. I actually want to talk to you about bone broth Cause I got a bag of bones in my freezer. I appreciate you, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Michael. I appreciate everyone listening. Thanks for your time. See you out there.
Speaker 1:Perfect. All right, folks. That's it. Another couple stories in the books. Again, I want to thank Donnie, of course, for coming on the podcast. It was super exciting to hear that he's a listener, but just to chat with the guy because he does such interesting stuff. Again, if you aren't following him, give him a follow. All the links you need are in the show notes, his YouTube, some of his socials. I, immediately after recording this, went and watched that eel story on First man Out and it was epic. So thank you, Donnie, for coming on the podcast. I really do appreciate it To you listeners. Thank you, guys for tuning in. Please give Donnie a follow. Beyond that, guys, share us with one person today and also give us a review on whatever you're listening on and now get out there and make some stories of your own. Thank you.
