DIY Sportsman - Sportsmen's Empire

In this episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett discusses what has become his favorite shotgun setup for specifically hunting turkeys. This is a gun he originally purchased for his wife, but after setting it up and making a couple of customizations, Garrett has been using it for all of his hunts as well. In the episode, Garrett breaks down the actual make and model of the gun, the choke setup, after market stock, pistol grips versus standard sporter style grips, sling mounts, and red dots compared to the standard bead sight. He also mentions a couple drawbacks of the concept that could be noteworthy depending on your preference. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more relevant outdoor content!

On today's episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett sits down with Mike Funderburk out of South Carolina to talk about the Hunt Better platform. This new content platform puts a focus on teaching and preserving woodsmanship skills through livestreams, detailed video hunt breakdowns, and long format video conversations. Mike explains what initiated the idea, what people can expect, and where things are headed. In addition to talking about the Hunt Better platform, Garrett and Mike talk about hunting in the South and how it differs from the Midwest, what types of deer habitat features that seem to be common across the country, technology, challenge hunts, and how experience can often be one of the best guides for learning skills first hand. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more relevant outdoor content!

In today's episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett lays out a short and sweet planning method to help you scout efficiently as we get closer to early spring and prime-time for most post season scouting. It's key to remember what the main focus is for post-season scouting, what you can learn, but also what you can't. Then use the amount of available time combined with goals to methodically pre-plan routes and loops and adjust as necessary. It's an easier method to ensure you gather the most amount of good intel in the time you have available.Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more relevant outdoor content!

On today's podcast Garrett speaks with guest Rendell Erik. He's been on the podcast now a few times to talk about scouting and hunt recaps. Based in Iowa, much of his focus is on finding and targeting the biggest and oldest bucks that he can find across a variety of public land pieces that he keeps tabs on. Today's episode is a little different. It's more about calling audibles, dealing with challenges, trying to make the best decisions on the fly as possible when plans A, B, and C blow up. Often Rendell Erik fills his tag earlier in the season before the rut kicks into full gear. This year, after sacrificing some of his season to scout and hunt with a good mutual friend of ours who had drawn a non-resident tag, he had to dig deep and hunt throughout the rut and even into the later gun seasons. He also saw more pressure this year than in years past, and had dry conditions and crop rotations that made early season patterns less repeatable than normal. This is an insightful episode because because it looks at how you can take a good mental approach and take the right actions when things aren't going your way. 

In this episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett recaps his recent trip down to Alabama for the second annual Veteran's Hunt put together by Spartan Forge. This event helped raise money for two organizations supporting vets as well as provide a fun hunt atmosphere for everyone involved. Prior to the actual hunt starting, Garrett had driven down from Minnesota to do a day of scouting and still hunting a vast area of public land, which ended up yielding deer sightings at close range and confidence for any potential future trips going back. Once the hunt started, Garrett paired up with a marine corps vet to hunt with. They ended up killing deer on back-to-back-to-back evenings, and Garrett describes some of the hunts in more detail which were a combination of pre-sets, hang-and-hunts, and still hunting in the rain. Camp camaraderie, stories, jokes, and food were top notch. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more relevant outdoor content!

Today on the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett discusses five of the best things you could be doing right now related to hunting. Seasons have ended in most midwestern states, and if you're towards the northern edge of that you've still got 1 to 2 feet of snow on the ground. Seems like ice fishing could be your best bet. But there are some pretty valuable activities that you can still do during the winter months. Some of the items include analyzing certain details of the 2022 hunting season, some are more forward thinking, and others are just a bunch of fun. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more awesome content!

On today's episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett does a strategy review and analysis as a baseline for how to improve next year. He doesn't review any of the specific hunt details because those already have their own hunt breakdown episodes. This exercise is one that Garrett does each year with to help review and analyze what did or didn't work to try and improve for the following season. That action is something which can help anyone, and it's a useful tool even outside of deer hunting.Garrett will plan on doing much of the same weapon type hunting next year, using a combination of traditional and compound hunting across a handful of tags. But there might be a change to the location of the earliest velvet hunt, and there will certainly be a change in the location of any firearms hunting. Garrett also talked about an additional strategy he'd need to employ to help be better prepared to tackle his pre-rut hunts next year.Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more awesome content!

On today's episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett sits down with Troy Fowler (aka the Ranch Fairy) and Darrel Barnette, who some of you may have also seen on either the Ranch Fairy channel or watching the Hunting Public. Garrett put together a string jump timeframe dataset corresponding to arrow speed and time of flight for discussion. The data was derived entirely on video footage Garrett had from deer shot at inside of 30 yards, but mostly inside of 20. Much of the string jumping debate seems to revolve around longer shots and whether or not speed is irrelevant compared to how fast deer can react. But rarely do you hear people talk about the relationship for close range shots. The group discusses that topic and also some of the longer range unknowns. There's not really any agenda pushing in this episode. It's just open dialogue discussing a data set, how it might apply to your own decision making, what limitations are there, and what type of additional questions we still have and data we'd like to collect and analyze to continue to learn. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more awesome content!

On this episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett breaks down his archery hunt success out of state. This hunt was during a firearms season as well. That pressure did play a role in strategy, but so did timing in proximity to the peak breeding timeframe of the rut. Garrett describes the thought process and strategy going in, how that changed over the first several hours in the woods, what type of sign he found to trigger setting up in a tree right away, and the play-by-play of the hunt. In addition, some of the details related to the frontal shot were broken down in this episode. Check out the Sportsmen's Empire Podcast Network for more awesome content!

In this episode of the DIY Sportsman podcast, Garrett reviews the hunt strategy and breakdown of his Wisconsin buck. In addition to discussing terrain features, setup relationship to bedding, and the actual hunt unfolding, he discussed some unforeseen challenges through late October that required a change of plans, strategy, and goals heading into the rut. This was also the first deer in a long time Garrett had shot using a lighter arrow and big mechanical, so he gives his performance observations there.