Ep. 160: BEAR GREASE [RENDER] - Songs & Bucks

Published Nov 8, 2023, 10:00 AM

This week on the Bear Grease Render, Clay Newcomb is joined by Ben Lagrone, Dr. Misty Newcomb, Gary "Believer" Newcomb, and "This Country Life's" Brent Reaves. The crew plays a song featuring banjo, guitar, shaker egg, and a set of spoons. They then turn their attention to discussing: Accidental discharges - shooting a mobile home and and a foot with a bow and arrow. Brent chasing a school bus with his dad's truck. Ben's biggest buck and Clay's issue with dog tracking for whitetail deer. And the crew's favorite stories from "Deer Stories: Passion and Lies." We really doubt you’re gonna want to miss this one…

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My name is Clay nukelemb And. This is a production of the bear Grease podcast called The bear Grease Render, where we render down, dive deeper, and look behind the scenes of the actual bear Grease podcast, presented by f HF Gear, American Maid, purpose built hunting and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the place as we explore. Welcome to the bear Grease Render, everybody. I've got my wife, doctor Missy Nucomb here we're going to We're gonna start off things a little different today, Dad with a kind of a sentimental song about the woods. Usually we'd come in pretty hot and sing so Johnny Cash or you know something. But this is a little a little more laid back.

Have you ever wondered lonely through the woods? Everything there phil just as it should, part of life there, You're part of something good. Have you ever wondered lonely through those woods? If you've never wondered lonely through the woods.

You never started into a starry sky lying on your back and asking why, what's the purpose?

I wonder?

Who am I? You never stared into a starry sky?

Oo ah.

Ah? Have you ever started into a sorry suy.

Never been now walking in the snow, trying to.

Get back where you were before.

Always end up I'm knowing where to go. Have you ever been out walking.

In the show?

Who you haven't been walking? You wouldn't know?

All right, all right, excellent, excellent.

We had Brent Reeves on the shaker. Brent, great to see you.

That's ah. This needs to be identified as a wooden egg full of lead shot. I think wooden egg full of lead shot.

Great to see you, Brent, Thank you, Buddy to Brent's left, Ben La grown on foods. Good to see you, Good to see it, Ben, thanks for coming. Man on the Render, we used to sing. I bet we used to sing. There was a time when my idea for the Render was to have a live band here every single no no, I mean not just me. I was gonna try to have a live band here every single Render to play and I did you know, it just didn't happen. But it's been a while since we sang. If you if you're new to The Beargrease Render, this is the Burgers podcast is documentary style podcast. The Beargrease Render is where we gather around every other week and talk about the actual bear Grease podcast. Early on the first year, we played music probably every two or three times, not because we think we're good, but because we like to have fun. We like, as we said, you know, our kids. So last night, my daughter, Missy, and I were practicing and my daughter, who was in her room it's supposed to be asleep, texted me and.

Said, uh, hey, y'all sound great.

She said, yeah, y'all sounds great and I and there was a delay in the next text, and I was like, man, that's really nice. I was actually encouraged. I was I need a little encouragement from time to time with my music. And then the next text was how long are y'all going to be playing? And the next text said PTSD.

Yeah, she's talking about you know. We started playing during COVID and that song was one of the first songs I ever learned to play on the banjo, and that when Clay heard that song, he was like, I think I can play the guitar, like it was so unimpressive. He's like, I could do that too.

I forgot I could play guitar.

Y'all missed. The funniest thing I've said in years is when I found this egg, I thought, man, can sit on this. That's kind of like what he does.

Ain't it good?

Hats this out while y'all are playing.

I used to play spoons, like you know, it's two separate spoons. That's like luxurious stuff right there.

Yeah, I kept waiting for you to do the old Why how.

Are you a good spoon player? Ben trained spoon spoon players.

It's in my percussion repertoire.

Okay, okay, hey, Ben used to play for the Arkansas Razorbacks marching band.

Oh yeah, that's right. That's why the percussion was coming so easy to you.

Sometimes I feel like we should just go around and say the most astonishing facts about ourselves and our achievements that no one knows about. You know, it seems really important in high school, some of the things you did and hasn't mad.

Would you like to say?

I don't know, doctor, weirdly know, I was thinking more about Yeah, I'm trying to think of obscure facts likes.

To Brent's whole podcast is obscure facts about his life. So Brent Raves is here, render boy, Brent Raeves And what I laughed out loud for real, this is no joke and there's there's big potential for bias in me because you're my friend. I want you to succeed. You know, This Country Life is on the bear Grease feet, so there's like big, big question marks around whether my opinion is legit. However, I'm gonna say it is because they're just as big a biases about being critical about just the work that we're doing. So like I'm like very critical of you too, sure, And so I would feel every morning.

Oh it's all the the phone ringing late Clayon. I like, well, he's not asking me to go film him, so I am in trouble.

Yeah.

Yeah, So I feel like those two things balance out, like my love of you and want you to succeed, but also me scrutinizing your every word and uh, I laugh out loud by myself almost every single time I listened to This Country Life, I really do. I mean, Brent is an astounding writer because he and I've had You know, you could listen to some of Brent's stories and be like, how could have all this have happened to one person, which is a legitimate question. But I've been around Brent enough to know to have been to hear him tell a story that even I was a part of, and it was like, well, geez, I wouldn't have told it near that entertaining. So, I mean, I think Brent. It might seem like Brent has had like an exceptionally wild life. I think he's probably had a more wildlife than most people. Yeah, but he's a really really good storyteller and remembers detail and remembers stuff that other people don't. So I'm paying you a big compliment, but I'm also drawing it. I'm also trying to make sense of it. But no, you're your your last one about three stories that didn't fit. Yeah, So the ethical qualms that I wanted to bring up was cursing in church. Did y'all hear that?

That's the funniest stories?

Yeah, Hunter, your son hearing his father used foul language.

Three days before that? I mean, you would think of all the things that happened to a little fella in three days. I mean, it's everything he looks at in every direction. It's something new, you know. I mean, because he's just learning to talk and learning to hear and learn to pay attention to things that's going around him, you know, And of all the things of all the things that happened in that span of time, that was the one thing he keyed on, and in the one place he remembered that he had a city wide audience. We were being broadcast on the radio that day. The church service was.

Mm hmm, and then uh and then your buddy who shot Jesus.

Oh gosh, man. I have told that story so many times, and it is it's it always starts out some you know. It's like you do. Sometimes you'll say, Brent, tell me a story, and I'm like, I ain't got one, you know, it's just things happened, and and that reminded me of something. You know, we're riding down the road. That's when the best stories come out, when we're doing something else and I'm like, oh gosh, I just saw a redbird. That reminds me of something. But if somebody points a pistol at me, it says, tell me a story. I'm like, okay, I got a buddy that shot Jesus. One time, I can tell you that story.

So it was a misfire, like he was. He didn't mean.

He didn't, Yes, exactly, he didn't. He thought he had unloaded his gun. There's lots of story, lots of lessons in that. Yeah, he wasn't he wasn't upset thinking he had shot Jesus. He had shot his pistol in his house. Yeah, yeah, a loaded firearm that he thought was unloaded.

Now was he being funny when he No, he was very distraught. But why did he say I'm going to hell?

He took it. It was so a big burden on him. Now, this guy had just gone to work as a police officer. He hadn't gone to the academy yet, so he had a big burden. And in the state of Arkansas, I'm not sure that rookies now are if it's the same way or not. But you when we went to work, you had a year from the time you were hired by a department and be under a field training officer, and then within that year span, sometime during that year, you had to go to the academy and pass that to go, you know, back to work on the street and be a certified police officer. So he hadn't done that yet. So everything that he's learning he's learning from a you know, the officers above him. And he was getting ready to go.

To work that night, and he's quick drawn, Yeah, revolved. Was he pulling the trigger?

Well?

Apparently so?

Well, I mean, but but it was if it was like if you I've got a story, But if a revolver, if you feel like it's unloaded and it's a double action, you pull the trigger, the hammer drops back and then fires.

Correct.

So I mean he must have been doing that.

Absolutely it was.

Yeah, okay, let me ask you a question. Okay, And if you have any other comments on this country life, now's now's the time. Have you ever accidentally discharged the firearm?

No?

Never, not once? Never?

I take that back, Yes, I have turkey hunting.

Okay, yep, see I knew it. What happened me?

And do you feel like you're being unfairly interrogated right now?

No? Okay, because I could lie just a Tuesday.

I'm just watching the facial expressions here, trying to figure out what clays.

I could have. I could have lied and said no, but I do recall all the time. Uh, And it was a faulty. It was a brown and pump shotgun had a broken safety. Me and another friend of mine had left going turkey hunting in the afternoon. We were walking down this road and he said you better. We need to load up now because we as soon as we step off in the woods, we got to sit down. Right, there's a turkey. We knew where the turkeys at. So when I'm standing, I've got my barrel away from everybody, I went in, threw one in the magazine, in the from the magazine into the barrel, and as soon as it slide hit home, bam, it went off. Really yeah, and that's with my That wasn't my finger touching the trigger and I didn't have a finger in the housing there. Wow, that's it went off? Yeah, absolutely, did Ben?

Have you ever shot a firearm intentionally?

No?

I haven't, Dad, I shot holding my gris.

You did, Yeah, I vaguely remember that. It was after I was you know, it was in an area where that peg board is and the backside of it's all rock, you know on the outside. Uh huh, and uh. It was pretty revealing. You know how dangerous it is to play with firearms.

You know what were you doing? I was just cleaning my gun or something.

I don't know.

It was probably at three fifties and I couldn't have been a revolver.

I don't know what it was, but I.

So you intentionally pulled the trigger. You just didn't think it was loaded. Yeah, you just thought you had cocked it. And they're just gonna kind of yeah. Yeah, pretty stupid. Pull the trigger. Pull the trigger, man, Miss nukemb Have you ever fired a gun on accident?

I have a story about a bow and arrow. Okay, So when when we were all little, my brothers left my two middle so I had three older brothers, and then me and my parents left the two middle brothers alone for the first time. And the oldest brother was kind of law and order and he kept everything everything going well. I remember as we were pulling off, all of us felt a little bit nervous about the two middle brothers being home alone. I was the youngest sister, and I still knew this isn't a good idea. And as we pulled. As we pull out, my dad yells out the window, hey, don't play with bb guns while I'm gone. Like we were just they were just you could tell now as a parent, I know my parents were just thinking through all the things they could do to hurt themselves. So my brothers went back to their bedroom and got a bow and arrow. Now it wasn't like a professional bow and arrow. We weren't bow hunters or anything. I don't even know what kind it was, but apparently it had a an arrow that could go through a boot, through a leather boot. We learned that because my second oldest brother shot my brother right above me in the foot with this arrow while we were gone. And when we pull up, we just see being like writhing in pain on the ground outside, Randy looking very scared to see my dad pull.

You know.

They they were trying to get the boot off, but it was I mean, it was in his skin, and and so they were they were freaking out. And after that I decided to never mess with with anything. And so I was a good sister and always learned from my brother's mistakes. And so no, I have never not that I've.

Ever discharged the fire ate my compliments to him for not shooting Bob.

Yeah.

Yeah, they were just trying to keep you real.

Where are you going with this?

Well? Have you I've got a story one time, one time, I remember Misty called me when I was away and she she said, something's going on in the house. It was late at night. Do you remember this?

Oh?

I remember?

And it was real, It was real scary. She thought somebody was in our house and I wasn't there, and and I don't remember the details at all, so I won't elaborate on them. I just remember telling her, it's totally fine if you just want to take that pistol and just fire off around, just aim it right through the roof, just shoot. I told her to do that, and she didn't, and it ended up like being you know nothing. Do you remember that?

I vaguely I remember.

I remember thinking what it would be. I put the roof on my house when we built it, and I remember thinking it won't be too hard.

I very clearly remember, but that's not I don't remember it. I missed and missed the part about the roof. I remember you telling me just get the pistol and just if anybody's in the house, just shoot. And I said, what if I miss? And we just built the house.

And that was to shoot somebody.

Right, You weren't, but that's how I heard it. I was like, miss, and you said, hey, just just you told me just it's okay if you fire a bunch of holes in the in the sheet rock, and I just remember thinking it was really hard to put up.

I don't. Yeah, we take we take intruders pretty serious around our place. Real on the door text first come over, No Dad, I've told you this story. I'd be perhaps you won't remember the details of it. But I got a Ruger forty four magnum nine inch barrel super Red Hawk for graduation. Graduation, a big, big pistol. I was doing some hog hunting and I was gonna deer hunt with it. And one day I was setting out on public land hog hunting and just board sitting on a log and it's a double action revolver and I was playing. I was fiddling with the double action double Do you know what a double action is, Misty. It's a revolver. So you cocked the hammer, but if you but well, if you pull the trigger, the gun goes off.

It way you talk down to the most highly educated person.

I like that.

That's my role in this, well.

A double action because I was I was in the hammer with my thumb click click, and pulling the trigger but having my thumb on the trigger and letting it down softly, just kind of getting a feel for the trigger. And I had just done it so much I just kind of got into like a comatose state. And I had that barrel laid across my leg just like this right here.

And uh.

And at one point I didn't put my thumb on the trigger and I just pulled the trigger and it just forty four mag I mean it was like a major thing, like it was. Yeah, and I probably never I learned a lot from that. It left black marks on my pants.

Sure on both ends.

Do you remember that that? No, I don't you know. I didn't tell you this story.

Never made it to my ears.

I didn't tell you for a long time. I did tell you that eventually.

Okay, I feel like this is sweet.

Remember he has drank that out of his mind.

It was not good, not good at all. How old were you I would have been like in high school that gun. Yeah, So firearm safety big theme in this country life. Okay, the other the other.

Hey, I got a call one time when I was the deputy share here's a law enforcement story. Got a call one time this lady said, somebody shot my house. And so, man, we're beating feet over there. We'll see what's going on. And we go into this lady. She lives in a mobile home in the middle of nowhere and she was in the laundry room ironing and the deep freezes in there, and laying on top of the deep freeze is a forty five round that's made a dent in the deep freeze. But it came straight down through the roof. Somebody shot the gun up in the air and he came came through the roof, hit the deep freeze right beside where she was ironing.

Really yeah, just the bullets laying there, just the bullet. Yeah, So it had lost enough velocity that it probably wouldn't have killed somebody.

It would have hurt. Yeah. I mean it came through and it made a big dent in that deep freeze. It hit her on the top of the head.

This is this is like the side of the Unsolved Mysteries where like eventually comes out like there's somebody listening to this right now down around Warren, Arkansas. What county was it, County? Union County, Arkansas. That's going, man, I let one fly straight up in the air.

Yeah.

I've always felt like if you if you shot like because like squirrel hunting, you're shooting twenty two rounds in the air, and if you miss, like twenty two rounds just going in the air. I've always felt like they would lose enough velocity that it would be like dropping a twenty two round like out of an airplane, like it would just hit on the ground. Do you think that's true.

I don't think any of that's even close.

You remember me telling the story about shooting the game warden's house. That's one story that it's not quite as dramatic as that introduction. But whoa, I've got a story. I told you you got to want you hear it.

You'll remember it.

But uh the game warden lived right next door to me, and his house burned. He moved mobile Homi in and I was shooting my bow in the backyard and I missed my target and it hit hit a rock and flew right in the back of his and uh so I went and knocked on his door, and I said, man, I got some bad news for you. He was really nice about it.

So anyway, I appreciated that.

Robert Ball really nice guy. And you just pulled the air out, Yeah, did he do you have to repair it?

No, it was a little low, and you know, you didn't notice it much.

His wife we had to call the amulus first wife, not really so if you own somewhere around Hot Springs, Arkansas, a nineteen sixty four double wide with a small arrow hole, and it may have been that mobile.

That's right.

Uh, that's funny. That's funny. Okay. The other thing I listened to the I got caught up on this country life this week, and so your your story of chasing the school bus in the truck?

How about that?

I mean, that's crazy, Brent. You must have been a wild kid.

Man. I just have wild ideas and it didn't take me long.

I'm not afraid that your dad would have.

I wasn't scared of nothing.

Did your dad not?

I told you I've been on h Spencer's Meat Eater Trivia twice, and when I sit out in that chair, I know I'm fixing to win. I have got a total of four questions right out of twenty of the two times I've been on there.

That's the usual amount of undeserved confidence.

But when I sit down there, I think, man, I am fixed to kick everybody's butt in't here. I just I never walked up to the plate. I didn't think I wasn't going to hit a home run. I hit won and little I had no reason to think that. But I don't lack for self confidence.

But when you were nine years old taking your dad's truck and chasing the school bus.

The only thing I could think of was me passing that school bus and throwing them the deuces as I went by, and barely looking over the steering wheel.

Wow, we don't my dream of mine. And I'm going to cast this out there and this will hopefully get back to who I wanted to get back to. I want to have Tim Reeves on this podcast.

Ah, he's a good He's a better storyteller than I ever will.

Will he do it?

Nope?

Yeah, will Tim eventually to the Bear Grease Render podcast. We want to embarrass you and just Isn's brother all these stories.

But you just yeah, you just talked about his dad, just making sure everybody knows it's brother and father.

Yeah, yeah, he will come.

He's the best storyteller in the world.

And we get like, you know, I don't want to even tell. I don't want to even talk. I just wanted to sit there.

When we would sit around at the duck camp and talk, he was just spitting out one story after another. My buddy that taught me how to that started me in in outdoor video would grab a camera and set it up, and Tim was like he forgot how to talk. He had a stroke or something. He's just like he just freezes up. Man.

Yeah, this is not what I believe about Tim. Tim would be great. Tim, You're invited, Please come there you go.

Hey, let me tell you my favorite story from this country life lately. Brin's retirement story.

Oh yeah, that was.

That was.

Shep is the one that told me to listen to it, really, Shep new Coombe did. Yeah, he listened to it. He and Clay were on the way to ball practice and they didn't finish it. He went to ball practice, he came out and he said, Dad, can we can we finish up that podcast? And so they came in and they said, you should really listen. Listen to this one. Brent's going to retire. I guess did you read you recorded it before you retired, like the week before you retired, so you weren't retired anyway. So I listened to it that day and yeah, that was. It was a very touching Brent.

That was Is that where he went over the fence?

Yep?

Yeah, I would get the lady that was really good.

That was really good. Man.

I tell you what, I tell you what I would have done. I would have called in sick.

Somebody had to go in there.

How's it feel to be U It's uh.

It's kind of surreal. Yeah, you know, that's a big responsibility that I carried for a long time, thirty two years, and it feels good. It's uh, it's strange though, it's it's just a little weird, you know. And I told, I told Alexis, you know, Bailey, who's eleven, she's so much younger than my other two children, Amy and Hunter, who they were aware of the things that I was doing and the stuff I was going through, and and uh, it was hard. And uh, I told Alexis said, I don't want Bailey to ever even know anything about that stuff that I used to do. And she says, I think that's wrong. She needs to know about her daddy did, so when she gets older, you know, maybe maybe she can learn some of that kind of stuff. But she's probably right. She probably doesn't need to know eventually, because it gets kind of an excuse of why I'm so crazy. But yeah, it's been a lot of it's been pretty pretty wild.

Yeah, well cool, No, I'm I love it.

I love it very much.

Yeah, Ben, what you got there on the floor is the deer. Let me see that thing. I hadn't even touched it. He's got a good mass, So Ben, Ben killed the biggest buck like you've ever killed?

Yep, yep. On September twenty third, twenty twenty three.

Well open, there's more impressive than what I saw on video or what the photo I saw. Just the mass. Yeah, like that that was. You know, you can tell a lot. You can't. You can't judge a white tail entirely based upon mass, but you can tell quite a bit about their age, just maturity level. Maybe not fine tune in it, but I mean that's for sure a four and a half year old plus deer for around here. Yeah, it's it's a it's a ten point.

Don't don't you know how much you score? If your score?

No, I hadn't scored it. I mean, yeah, are you going to score it today?

Uh?

I don't know, might as well you could.

You always be disappointed.

That's kind of where I've been, is like I don't want to taint my perspective.

Scores, you know. So back in the day. I mean back when this American hunting television started in the in the in the nineties, late eighties. Man, if you saw the cover of a VHS tape at Walmart that said one hundred and forty inch buck by bo, you were just like, holy cow, I want to see that one fifty for sure they would be like man, I mean, and those were big numbers. I don't really understand what's happened. There are more one forties, one fifties and bigger deer, but more people have cameras, more people are filming, and in the outdoor industry, there's just a lot more one hundred and sixty seventy eighty ninety two hundred inch deer being killed on film. But a one hundred and forty inch buck is still just as hard to kill and still just as elusive. Like in my if my in my hunting locally, like I hunt one hundred and forty inch deer about once every eight years, just the truth, I mean, And I have hunted some good deer in the last several years. But but I say that, to say a deer like that, I wouldn't even score because it won't it probably won't. It won't score one forty, so it might as well just just say you think it's one sixty. Yeah, I would just say probably it's probably in the ballpark of one sixty.

But it was the story that meant so much to me and just how all the stars aligned. Yeah, well all that's well, even just this place I'm hunting is some private land that I was I've been picking up the phone and writing letters, trying hard to find a place to for me and my little girls to hunt. It was like winning the lottery, Like I couldn't believe that they called me after getting my letter. The summer, I was scouting and put cameras up, and this is one of the first bucks on camera, really, and I and I just thought, and he was consistent, I mean almost daily, and it was just like is this too good to be true? Like I write this letter, I'm hunting this land, this does the first buck I see. I talked to Jessica and my wife, and I was like, listen, he's so consistent. If I stay out there all day on opening day, like he will die. There's no way I'm not gonna see him. I stay all day. So I get out there opening day and it's like ninety degrees. I don't know if you remember how hot it was. It was so hot, and I stay, I saw doze just all day. I went came back out around four o'clock and thinking like, man, I can't believe this buck has it come. Just like so many of those hunts, it was right at dusk that these four to doho come out. And they come up and all of a sudden, it's like they just like I had a neon flashing light on me, and they just got so nervous and they all were working me and stomping their feet and all that jazz for probably about twenty minutes. Oh really, And I was just so nervous. I was like these I was like, I really hope the buck doesn't come out right now when these dough are about to sure enough, I see three bucks coming from the thicket. And let me tell you this. I know where this buck sleeps, I know where he eats. I mean, I know his schedule and where this guy's at. He comes up from the thicket and I'm just thinking, golly, while he's dough on me and you.

Can see him come.

He's coming, He's coming, and he the doe start walking away they were spooked, like, not to the point of running, but they're just like, I don't like this guy. And he comes in to feed while she's still kind of spooked at me, and I just got nervous, like I didn't want to wait around too long. And it was dusk, and so he was. He was slightly quartered a quarter toward me, you know, not preferable. But I knew I just I needed to take a shot. Well, I shot, and I did hit him. I knew I hit him, but the way he behaved, I thought, I don't know if I hit him.

Real great.

He ran twenty yards and looked around with his little buddies beside him, and then he just turned up the this mountain that I'm on and he just ran one hundred yards and I watched him run up the pill uphill pill I mean sprinted. I thought, oh no. Well, eight minutes later I hear him crash. Well, I got down and check my arrow and it was gut shot and I was like, golly. To make things crazier with it not only getting dark, is we've got a massive thunderstorm coming in in about thirty minutes. And me and my daughter, my oldest daughter, go out. I mean just ride at dawn and we searched high and low that area where he was at. We couldn't find blood, We couldn't find anything, and it had.

Poor Yeah, was gone right.

We searched for two hours up on that mountain and then I went down to the thicket where I know he beds. I thought that's not where he goes, and there'd be water flowing. Looked around a bit and I knew that'd be like a need on a haystack. And my friend Matt Taylor, he knows the guy with a dog, so he come out. He was actually confident about the rain. He said that when the deer dying, that there's a pharrenomb that released through their hoof, and the rain actually kind of spreads it out a bit. And he said his dog's tracked after rain all the time. I was like, okay, that's yeah exactly. Anyway, he got.

Some comments on that here.

Yeah.

Yeah, he gets out there and the dog she picked up. She picked up his trail from where I shot all the way up the mountain, and then she got real confused, and he said it's it's probably because we were walking around so much. So they say, I was like, that's great, excuse. Well, he stayed out there. We searched for hours, We worked that mountain, and then I convinced him to go down to the thicket. We tried the thicket and uh couldn't find him, and I was pretty devastated. It was just like, I don't know what what to do next. You know, it meets gone and this there's just this thicket is bad.

It's so thick.

Well, anyway, I slept on it. We'll got Monday morning. I said, I'm gonna take a day off work and I'm gonna go search that thicket, every inch of it. He's got to be there, he's he's got to be dead. He's got to be on this eighty acres that I'm hunting. So I literally get to that thicket and zig zag it in a perfect systematic way. I'll show you my on X trail later, Brent and Gary of where I was.

I was gonna ask if you used on X to I'll show you. It'll make a real grid.

I mean it was crazy. Yeah, But anyway, it's now like almost evening and I thought, you know what, I'm gonna go walk to the total opposite end of the property. I'm gonna make a big circle. I'll go over the mountain again, and then I'll go to this fence line I know of, And this fence line it splits the woods up where this farmer lets his cattle sometimes go, and so it's real wide open woods. And then on my left will be my thick woods that I think he's in. Well, on those rare looks to the right, about one hundred and fifty yards, I see a giant vulture and I thought, I think I just spook that vulture, and so I turned started walking in another one. I was like, they're eating something big. I start running and there's another vulture, and sure enough that was him. Whoa and he he ran from where I shot about four hundred and fifty yards. Based on the route he took by the crow flies, it was two fifty three hundred yards right, and so that's where I got him. It's I it was a story of perseverance because I'm the kind of person that's like, I don't like taking note for an answer, And when I woke up Monday, I was like, why do I really need to spend a day doing that? It's like, that's just what I've got to do. I know he's there.

You know what. The thing about a gut shot animal is that that's a mortal wound, so that that animal is gonna be gonna be dead.

You know.

Yeah, that's a bummer. You couldn't couldn't find it.

But yeah, because he had a lot of meat, it was it was huge. Yeah, definitely the biggest here.

I've talked to a guy. I've talked to two people and the last couple of weeks that have used drones to recover deer.

Yeah.

It was actually a guy in Missouri that had shot a deer and he told me and I said, and he talked to me about what happened, and it was like, how'd you find it? And he said, well, I had trouble finding it. He used a drone. And I actually was like, in the back of my mind was wondering if that was legal. Yeah, and because you can't use drones for hunting, but it's totally one hundred percent legal in Missouri. I don't know every state, but they're actually companies. They are people that are licensed drone operators that have businesses. And he called a you know, like drone operator company to come and they charged like four hundred dollars just to show up and one hundred dollars if they find the deer. I read on their Facebook page. So he paid them five hundred bucks and they found that deer just like that. It really his deer had run nine hundred and fifty yards from where he'd shot. Recovery really quickly.

This is my on X route. That that's my ladder stand. That's that thicket, and he was way over here.

Nice, that's pretty nowhere nowhere.

Near and and that that all that blue is that thicket.

Oh we care how you covered it.

I'm gonna say something here, and it's it's everybody knows how pro I am of hound hunters and hounds love hounds, grew up running dogs. I'm gonna throw this out there for the the dog tracking community.

Two.

Uh, I don't know just a charge. I've rarely I I when people tell me they're gonna call a dog, I'm just like, good luck it it I And it's not the dog's fault. It's not the handler's fault.

And uh.

And and if some of my friends that have dogs and have attracted ear for me, hear this, brothers know that I love you every dog handler. I know is training a pup? Was your guy training a pup?

No?

Are you sure? Well not with us, but it was a younger dog that he hadn't run or something.

Well, no, he it was a veteran dog. He told me. He told me a story that's like identical circumstance.

But everybody, I'm always going to training and uh and then uh and then they want you to get out and see. This is where the story gets. This is where it's tough. You call a dog guy and he's like, well, stop looking, and you got to stop looking and wait till he gets there. And that's where I think most people mess up because you should have just kept looking. Do you see what I'm saying? I mean anyway, so I've got a little bit of a qualm with dog dog trailing, not that there's anything wrong with it, but.

Just Britain and I am very nervous.

I mean, I love them, I love love I know lots of good dog trailing guys, but I just I just haven't seen them. Yeah, and yeah, I've used them before. I've used them before.

But yeah, I think what you're trying to say is it's not like the.

Perfect it's not. It's not. I'm not. Yeah, that's the good thing.

I got my hopes of I got my hopes way too high.

Yeah. Most if you've never been around the recovery, and people are gonna right me and they're gonna be upset with me. I'm just telling you, I've hunted my whole life. And when they say you're calling the dog, you're in trouble. It's what you should do. You know, what do you do? You know what I'm saying.

I know, here's what you should say. Practice shooting better. Yeah yeah, amen, Yeah, put the dog trailers out of business, make good shots. Yeah.

Well, and I think too if if you're referring to people, we'll call it a dog almost as a last resort. And it is causation or correlation, you know, like these things are correlating, but the dog doesn't. But the deer is pretty good and lost. Something's wrong. Yes, that's people dogs in bad circumstances.

Exactly, That's exactly PhD.

Right.

Yeah, it's just not a guaranteed thing. It's just not a guarantee. You walk and now you want a dog to find it. Yeah, and he's going to end up at Walmart and the grocery section.

I'm kind of mad at the hunters and I'm so pro dog right now that I'm kinda mad.

No, I mean my father gutshot. It wasn't his, that's true.

Yeah, well, uh, brand, what was your favorite deer story of this one? This episode?

K C story was good and I've heard him tell that one before. You know that that was good.

Uh And when rattled that buck in you can watch that on their YouTube channel. Yeah, it's a good and saw the med Eater YouTube channel.

It's it's a good it's a good story and he tells it so well. I mean, he's very enthusiastic about it. But my as far as my absolute one hundred percent favorite, I like yours was great. Come on, I really liked that. That was a good story.

Killing the deer in the coyoke.

And the deer was good.

Which one is it?

It's which it's that double white throat patch up there right?

Yeah, that is pretty in it.

That's uh. That was a good.

Story, better than mister Henry's story.

Mister Henry is great, and I don't know that I could pick a favorite of him because there's there was a lot of differences in him. You know and that even the dog hunting story, you know, yeah, I identify that we used to have dogs, running dogs and deer dogs, but we didn't have walkers. We had beagles. I was telling somebody that other day about there was like, man, you know them walker dogs or throat pushing those dear bodyes so fast. You know, it's like a quick drawl. You know, it's like a shooting gallery out there. And I was like, man, we had beagles and we sat on the I remember sitting on the stand one time. These beagles. Can hear them coming out there and they sound like, you know, miniature hound dogs. And they was and they had logged in this in this place where I was. Where I was, we were hunting the year before, the winter before, so there was and it had been wet, so there was some deep skinner ruts in there, and you could hear you could hear them, the beagles coming, but they was oh oh, And then you hear them.

No going down, And I thought, what the world is that?

And I got to look it out there and I could see like a hundred yards you can see them all together coming across the top of the ground and put the disappeared barely.

That's great falling in the sky.

But anything with dogs, man, you know, I'm am about that. But mister Henry, mister Henry, is that guy's a legend. I'm surprised I hadn't already heard about him.

Yeah. Yeah, But then which one stood out to you?

Well?

The dog one was my favorite. And I'll tell you yeah, because saw my granddad deer hunted in the nineteen thirties and forties on horseback when there's hardly any deer in Arkansas, and that was the way they hunted. And so I've just grown up hearing those legends. And then that's how my dad started out hunting too, and so I've never got to experience that. So when I hear those stories and relate them to what I hear my granddad talking about growing up, it's it's like it helps me experience that. And when they talked about killing those three bucks, yeah, it's like I could just feel like how epic that would have been. How the camaraderie, Like it's like, wow, like all these guys bringing all these I mean, I had to have been just such a huge day for all of them. Yeah, involved, So I really enjoyed that story of all of them were good.

There were so many unwritten rules about that too. You like, the camp next door had dogs, and they run their dogs run a deer in front of us, And if we killed a dog or killed a deer in front of their dogs, we gave them half the deer. I was just might as like one of the eleventh Commandment. Everybody did that. Lots of stuff like that, and they would just make for good neighbors.

Yeah, Dad, which one stood out to you?

Well?

Obviously I liked yours the best, but if I hadn't raised you, I would probably you know, I liked the two hundred inch buck because it's so unusual. I mean, that's just like a freak story. I mean, how many guys in America has killed a two hundred inch buck? Yeah, so, I mean that's that's in a category all by itself. But mister Henry, mister Henry smokes. I saw that picture of his room, Yeah, that I've never seen a room like that before.

Yeah.

I mean, this guy's killed more bucks than I've ever even thought about. Yeah, and uh, you know for him to still be going at age eighty, I mean, like, you know, we we tracked some of the same periods. You know, I'm seventy five, he's eighty. Uh he could hunt. I couldn't.

Uh.

And so I see what he did and and I mean I'm like in awe, this guy. Yeah, I mean he's like did you say he was a legend? Should have been a legend we should have known about. I mean, you know, he's I don't think there's many people in the whole country that can match what him and his son did. Yeah, yeah, I was shocked. Like so my one of my one of my friends, Tracy Jones, over in East Tennessee, had said, Hey, there's a guy you got to meet over here in the mountains, and uh and and I knew nothing of this guy other than just what my friend told me. And uh so I went over there, and I didn't know what I was expecting. But that's not what I was expecting. Henry let us in his house. And and that video actually did not show the entire room. There were walls behind me that were full of big deer on Instagram.

Yeah, yeah, I love I loved it.

You probably told it the story better than the story really was about the guy's accusing him and his son. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, you said, well, and then they're hard enough to kill in the day. There are enough to kill in the daytime. I can't imagine trying to kill them the night. Yeah, no, they The other thing is is that they those are all I didn't say it, but those are almost all public land deer.

Now.

A lot of the biggest ones came from Illinois, you know. They They have gone to Illinois for thirty years and have and have They were never outfitted hunts. And he's just done it. He's just done a lot. But a neat guy. He just vibrated with excitement talking to him for real. Eve know, most older people you talk to their deer story is I've killed so.

Many deer, I don't care about doing it anymore.

Right, So when you find a guy like that, is that is so unique in itself that he's still fired up in seventy Now I'm sunenty five and I'm still fired up. Yeah, just as much as I was when I was thirty five. I dream about getting out, But after this knee surgery, I found other hobbies. Yeah that I like.

It's easier.

Yeah. I found hobbies that I don't have to climb moundas that I want to climb trees. I don't have to worry about older. I just go out and enjoy my hobby. So but I can't help it. I'm gonna be back in the woods at some time. Yeah yeah, Well the other thing, and I captured some of this on video that it doesn't really translate into putting it on social media that easy. But mister Henry has designed a tree stand that he's used for thirty years. He has a unique tree stand that's all his own design really, that's real lightweight and compact and that he uses. He has a he built an electronic deer cart for hauling deer. You know, once he got older and was hunting that far back in the mountains, he needed a cart. And man, that part of the world is it is incredible. They got big mountains too. I mean he was talking about those boomer little boomer chipmunk squirrels being over five thousand feet. I mean that's a high mountain with big relief. Like you know, if you're in Denver, Colorado, and you talking about a five thousand foot mountain, it might be flat. I mean, you know, the relief means how much mountain is actually there, but out there five thousand foot mountain might have four thousand feet of Really that's a big mountain.

You know.

One thing he.

Said that that caught my attention.

You're talking about five thousand feet, you're talking about going deep into wilderness. But he at least once said he went back, you know an hour. Yeah, I'm thinking about places that you and I've hunted.

I mean it's an hour and a half, two hours.

Yeah, So I mean I don't know, maybe the road I don't know, but I don't question this guy at all.

I mean any way, I mean he is like my new hero.

Yeah. What did you think about Aaron Stanfol's confession?

That was the funny story? You know what I thought about with that. I was like, you know when you're watching a sitcom and you're like kind of chuckling and laughing, and you kind of if you ever stopped and be like, if somebody did that in real life like that.

It wouldn't be funny, it wouldn't be funny.

And you wouldn't Yeah, You're like, nobody would actually do that. That's how it felt. Like, listen to the story, it's like, oh my gosh, you really did that.

Well, I would say the best thing that he did. Was he told the story? Yeah, I mean if he and I think he really was, like he was paying penance by just like telling the story.

Well, I just I'll tell this story just because it's funny. I don't because I don't feel guilty about it at all. But you mentioned my brother earlier. Tim, we did. We have shared everything together. He's eight years older than me. He is absolutely next week. He is absolutely my hero to this very second, always has been. He took me hunting when he should have been left me at home because I was more in the way than the help. But he took me.

And him I have a lot in common.

He took me with him, and we shared everything except turkeys. You know. He would go listen and I would go listen. I call and that night you hear turkey. This morning, nope, you hear one. I heard three, Nope, I didn't hear anything, and gone so far as to He's like, I'm not hearing anything down here at the river. I'm going to go somewhere else. I would go so far as to taking the turkey foot I had dried out and make tracks where I knew he was going to see him. He's like, man I got some sign down here and I cannot hear this turkey. I'm like, bro, just hanging there. He's in there. You got this, you just got You got to lay with it just to keep him off of my spot.

So okay, so this is this is no different than what.

It is, exactly the same thing, even more links that you're going. There was no when it came to turkeys. Now, deer wasn't that big a deal for me and him, So we were actually scared. We was going to kill a deer. Didn't have to mess with it while we were So we just did the deer hunting to keep us busy till duck season started. So I get it. I know where they're coming from. I don't know why Fest up to it, but because you can go to heaven with that on your conscious, surely, I hope people a turkey hunter, I am good to go.

Uh. I thought his story of killing the two bucks in Kansas was really good too.

They stay apart.

It just sounds so easy.

All those were very very good stories.

Every one of.

Them just unbelievable. Most of them, well, we've done so We've done three deer Stories podcasts and just a full disclosure. Part of the Deer Stories thing is a function of the amount of work that it takes to do a documentary style podcast. And in the fall, we're we're hunting, we're traveling, we're doing stuff, And so the Deer Stories is a way for me to collect stories. And I love him just as much as his documentary style podcast. Honestly, I think it's a good change of pace for people, and and I I really, I really enjoy it. But we're about to We're about to start learning stuff again. Sorry, guys, you' are gonna actually have to listen and pay attention and not have any more fun. We're just like, it's gonna be like a militant journey through American history culture, deep dives into yourself. We're gonna be digging up our own our own issues, looking at the world. You ready, Missy.

Hey, I'm just saying I know about a couple of these. It's gonna be a good It's gonna be a good little run.

Yeah. Oh gosh, I wish I could. I wish I could tell you what I'm working on. I've got three things I'm working on. Your shadow.

I have a funny story about about Bear, our son who's had an incredible dear season so far. Yeah, he's gone out and and and sought a lot of land and done a lot of scouting and has good public land options and uh. He he's good at recruiting people to come with him. So there's there's a little crew of guys that goes out and they go out and hunt, and then he's also good at bringing them back to help him process his his deer. He does a great job of that. And he was telling us about one of his friends. One of his friends has a romantic interest. I think I think this is this is an okay story to tell. I don't think I'm disclosing anything, and has been less interested in helping Bear process venison this the he Bear said, they have a group chat all these guys, and Bear texted and said, hey, you've not been as a as as in the deer hunting this year. What's going on? I think you your priorities are are a little a little skewed this year. And the guy writes back on the thread to all the guys and he said, bear into your You'll understand when your priorities change. And bear bear in front of all of us. We're all processing. We had like a little meat processing party, and Bear very adamantly and boldly said, my priorities will never change. I told my mom, and she said, you need to record that somewhere.

The same thing, the same reason y'all got your processing the deer is the same thing that's going to happen to Bear.

One.

I haven't heard that one.

Yeah, he said. We had a good way.

Strangely, I think Bear will have his life management skills down enough that he will be able to maintain high levels of integrity in both categories.

Well, I looked at him. I said, Bear, I'm pretty sure your priorities are going to change. And he said, well, what I'm saying and he started back pund a little bit. I'm just saying that I think that my I alreadies will be such that it can accommodate both. I will not have to cut back on any deer hunting. I'm telling you right now, Bear needs to cut back on his deer hunting, working to school. His priorities are not quite what they should be right now. But he's had a very successful hunting Season's funny.

That's good. That's good.

That's good. Well, Hey, thank you guys so much. Ben, congratulations on the big buck. Thanks Brent. This country life man, it's going awesome.

Thank you.

Hey, I will tell you this, I will foreshadow touch here. Here we go, Brent Raves and I are fixing to do a Mississippi River expedition.

Oh, the cats out, the catfish is out of the Look at what I.

Kind of had.

I'm wearing right here all that if you want to read that, Ben, what's it say? Boats arc man, Me and Brent have a I love it so much. Me and Brent have a twenty six foot sea arc boat with a three hundred horsepower Suzuki fully covered. I mean, it's it's just shy of Noah's Arc. And uh, we are we are going on a two hundred, two hundred plus mile expedition down the Mississippi River like our forefathers, Davy Crockett, Whole Collier. Just starting to list of names. They've been there, Twains, Daniel Boone, They've been there. And uh, We're going on a deer hunt, cat fishing trip, duck hunting trip on the Mississippi River. And at some point in the years to come, perhaps this will be people could see this through digital imagery.

Be good.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to Are they up here now?

They're at We're SEC. Yeah, they're in Monticello.

Ar good folks.

I was telling Steve Arnello about our Sea Arc boat and Steve was like, I have a Sea Arc boat and I said, well, they're from Arkansas, and uh yeah, Steve, Steve has a Sea Arc.

You eat a lot of boat companies in Arkansas. Yeah, yeah, what happens.

These guys work for like Ranger, and they learned the business and then they moved down here and start their own. That might not be how all this works, but you see it in a lot in different areas. Yeah. A good friend of mine, a college friend of mine that's got the Express boat in Hot Springs in Ranger boats in that boat and there's probably one or two that I'm forgetting. This War Eagle made in Arkansas.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's one of the best duck boats there.

Used to be Arc. Sea Arc is there. They're good stuff. Get a lot of good folks down there. I've been down there several times and I've gotten real close with the folks that are building our boat, and man they are they are absolutely focused on making boats and stuff. That we can use and a lot of folks can use out there on the big water.

It's twenty six foot. That's you wouldn't much smaller, would you.

Well, you wouldn't want much bigger really on for a like a pleasure craft, just because it would be too big. That's a big boat. Yeah, Yeah, that's a big boat. I mean it's it's made for the Mississippi River. I mean that's what that am I right, Bren, Absolutely, I mean that that's a river boat.

That's the Mississippi river boat.

I mean that's longer than this room we're in. Your cousin has had a twenty three foot and he had plans to go down the Mississippi. I don't remember if he ever did it, but twenty three I think would be a minimum. Yeah, I mean he can get dangerous out there. The river's super low right now. The river that's the only bummer about it. For the next little wild River's gonna be really low, which I mean won't make any difference. It's big enough for us to get down. But Mississippi River she's going dry, pretty preacher man says the end of time, Mississippi River she's a going dry. Yeah, yeah, what's the rest of the.

Song, Hank, country Boy can't Survive.

That was the class song for the senior class, right ahead of me.

Is that right cool?

Well, guys, thanks for coming. Good to see Ben, Dad, Misty. Great to see everyone.

Good to see you play.

Have a great week. Everybody's

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Bear Grease

Home to the Bear Grease podcast and Bear Grease Render show with Clay Newcomb, and This Country Life 
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