It was 1984, I was 8 years old.

 

After begging Dad for weeks he agreed to take me hunting.  We loaded the truck with some blaze orange game vests and the 12 gauge Ithaca then drove to a public hunting ground north of town.  Just 30 min into our walk we sat down and leaned up against a cedar tree to rest.  A few moments later I heard something walking around up ahead in a thicket but I couldn’t see it.  I whispered, “What is that?”  Dad said, “I don’t know but you better go check it out!”

 

I slowly stood up and after taking 10 steps from the cedar all of a sudden 2 ruffed grouse flushed.  It was like an explosion.  I couldn’t believe how fast and easily they navigated through the thick brush like rockets.

 

I was mesmerized and it was in that moment that I realized I wanted to become a hunter.

 

After completing hunter safety in 1988 I was eager to start the chase as soon as possible; the only problem was I didn’t have a driver’s license.  I quickly realized that if I took up bowhunting I could ride my bike to some public hunting land a couple miles away after school.  It’s safe to say that in the early years I made a lot of mistakes - that property was loaded with other hunters, folks walking their dogs & bike riders passing by - but those lessons learned helped shape me into the hunter I am today.

 

My first bow was a PSE Carroll Marauder and my first deer kill would be a small yearling buck. I was 14 yrs old and it was a 12 yard shot and after sending the XX75 Easton aluminum arrows through his heart he ran 10 yards before tipping over.  I couldn’t wait to tell Dad.  He couldn’t believe I shot a deer my first time in the woods. I couldn’t believe it either but it felt like I just done something special.

 

I shot a lot of deer throughout high school but nothing older than 3.5 yrs old which frustrated the heck out of me.  So I started reading every deer hunting magazine on the store shelves and buying hunting videos to learn as much as I could.  Unfortunately a lot of the techniques discussed worked better on tightly managed private property and 90% of the time I hunted public.  I will say that the skills learned on pressured public land made it a lot easier fore me once I did gain access to private parcels.

 

Then everything changed for me on Oct 20th, 2000.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was moving to Iowa in November that year to start chiropractic school but before I did I wanted to hunt really hard for a particular buck I named “Houdini”.  This buck lived on some islands on the Wisconsin river and I saw him 3 times before I shot him, once in 1998 and twice in 1999.  He was a very large bodied deer with a dark chocolate-colored rack.  This deer was smart and I knew of 2 other guys who were also after him.

 

I needed a straight west wind in order to hunt.  Beginning on Oct 12th I closely monitored the wind like a meteorologist.  On Oct 20th I had the wind I needed.  By 1:00pm my canoe was loaded up and I started the 1 mile paddle across open water and by 2:30 I was in my stand.  Where I was sitting was in a white oak flat that bordered a tag alder swamp.  The area is only accessible by way of boat which reduces pressure.  Most guys are duck hunting and walleye/musky fishing this time of year so I had the entire area to myself.

 

I hadn’t seen a single deer all night until last light.  I heard the distinct splashing and sucking sounds of a deer walking through the flooded cattails.  I stood up and grabbed my bow.  2 minutes later he appeared and was walking straight toward my mock scrape not 7 yards away.  When he was at 15 yards I came to full draw while keeping the oak tree between us, then leaned around the tree and shot him while he stood in the my mock scrape.

 

He ran less than 60 yards and piled up.

 

He scored just under 148 5/8” with 5” bases and he field dressed out at 210 lbs.  He was my first really big mature whitetail buck and I learned a lot by hunting “Houdini”.  

 

While both in college and graduate school I continued to pursue small game despite free time dwindling significantly with the work load.  With every opportunity I’d head up to the small hunting cabin my family owned in northern WI to chase ruffed grouse with my good friend Dan.  We hunted them practically every weekend from Sept through December.  It was also during that time I had an amazing Springer Spaniel named Katie.  We enjoyed many years of hunting together and she retrieved close to 500 grouse for us in just 4 years!  I miss her dearly… not only was she a once in a lifetime kind of companion, she was an absolutely incredible bird dog as well.

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After college I went to chiropractic school in Iowa.  Because of the intensity of grad school I didn’t get out to hunt much but on occasion I’d go pheasant hunting. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, due to the grueling work load, I had to leave Katie with Mom back in WI but had she been with me there’s no telling how many roosters I would’ve killed.  It was frustrating to be in the land of giant whitetails yet not have the time necessary to really get after them.

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After graduating from school and settling into my profession I decided to really step up my game in the whitetail woods.  I wanted to learn as much as I could in order to increase my success.  I wanted to know where they preferred to bed, feed, get water and why they used the routes they did to move about.

 

Since 1990 I’ve been blessed to hunt deer and turkey in many states including Wisconsin, Montana, South Dakota, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Connecticut, New York & Ohio. The terrain and therefore the challenges vary greatly from one state to the next but what that does is add to the overall experience.

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Today I live in Lexington, KY with my wife Fonta and my son Dakota. Recently my wife has shown an interest in deer hunting as well. I took her out during the November 2022 rifle season and she harvested her first deer, a 4 pointer on her second time out.  I was so proud of her! I can’t wait to take Dakota out for turkeys once he gets a little older and eventually for deer.

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Because of my experience hunting such varied terrain over the years I feel qualified to help land owners set goals, overcome challenges & take their deer hunting to the next level.  And everyone’s goals will be different. Your goal may be to simply see more deer. You may want to improve your own individual hunting skills or maybe to increase the average age of the bucks on your farm.  Whatever your goals are I would love the opportunity to help you achieve them and we’ll have fun along the way!