Episode 10: An old pro's elk hunting tips

Joe McCarthy knows elk hunting.

Raised in a family of hunters, McCarthy has been calling the wild since he was a kid. He started with ducks but thrives on the thrill of calling in big game. He's dedicated enough — and good enough — that he once bugled a grunting bull in so close that he was getting splashed with pee. 

McCarthy put his bugling skills to the test in 2022 at the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation's world elk calling championships, where he made it to the final round of competition in the professional division. As the product innovation lead at Slayer Calls, McCarthy has been able to put his decades of experience to use developing calls and building elk reeds that work exactly the way a serious hunter wants them to. He's been archery and rifle hunting for elk all over Idaho for decades, scouting out reliable hunting spots, scrambling over the rugged landscape, and packing out hundreds of pounds of meat for the freezer.

In this episode of The Slayer Hunting Podcast, McCarthy shares wisdom earned from long years of hunting elk in the Rocky Mountains. Slayer Calls' Bill Ayer and Tommy Sessions get McCarthy to reveal his best advice about scouting, breaking in new gear, getting in shape, filling your hunting pack, and packing out that massive elk you bagged. 

Check out posts and resources from this episode:

- onX Maps

- Garmin inReach

- Eberlestock hunting packs

- Slayer Calls brings Joe and Cody McCarthy into the blind

- Joe McCarthy takes 4th place at RMEF World Elk Calling Championships

Get ready to bag your own elk with these articles:

- Tips for choosing your first elk call

- Inside 2021 world elk calling champion Cody McCarthy's hunting pack

- Archery elk hunt: 7 tips for a first-timer

- 4 hot weather elk hunting tips

- Elk hunting tips for beginners: The do's and don'ts

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"I'd never start elk season without ______." Leave a comment or drop us a line at podcast@SlayerCalls.com to share your top tip to prepare for a successful elk season.

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Transcript

Bill Ayer:

Hey all, welcome to the Slayer podcast. I'm your host Bill Ayer, owner of Slayer Duck Calls, a company founded on family heritage, unrivaled quality craftsmanship, and an uncontrollable obsession for hunting. Let's get to it.

Tommy Sessions:

I'm Tommy Sessions with Slayer Calls.

Tommy Sessions (00:00:02):

Today, we have a preseason readiness for getting ready for the preseason, whether it be Elk, deer, but mainly today, we're probably going to be talking a lot more about elk. We have Joe McCarthy as our guest and as always Bill Ayer, the owner of Slayer Calls. I'll let Bill go ahead and introduce Joe.

Billy Ayer (00:00:20):

Yeah. So we brought Joe on about four, what? Five months ago, Joe, to the Slayer team. Joe builds our elk reeds. I'll let you tell your history with elk hunting, but you've been building reeds for 20, 30 years or longer. You finished fourth this year in World, the Pro Class World Elk Calling Contest up in Park City. So congratulations on that. That was awesome to see.

Joe McCarthy (00:00:42):

Thank you.

Billy Ayer (00:00:44):

I'll let you do the introduction, Joe. You tell us about yourself and where you grew up and how you got into elk hunting, how long you've been doing it.

Joe McCarthy (00:00:50):

Basically native Idahoan. My family's been here for, I guess, five generations before it was a state. Elk hunting for my grandmother and my grandfather on my dad's side was actually part of the way they lived. In fact, actually, when my grandma was around, they didn't even have elk in Idaho. It was more deer, but hunting in general was a subsistence thing where they need it for food. I actually grew up as a younger kid, my dad was a duck hunting guide and learned how to call ducks. And that's ultimately how that transitioned in high school and college into elk, just as the calling aspect of things. And so, pretty much if there's a way to call an animal, I like that part of the experience. And so elk hunting has been the biggest thing for me, just the sheer rush of elk being a large animal, very loud, standing within feet of you to where they can even be peeing on you. It's quite the rush. So that's my experience.

Tommy Sessions (00:01:57):

Have you been peed on in the mountains?

Joe McCarthy (00:01:57):

I have literally laid down where I had an elk in front of me when he was grunting and they're peeing that, that it was actually getting splashed. I was bugling for somebody else that didn't have a bow and I was just laying on the ground. And anyway, I've been in that situation a couple times and it seems like it's always an experience.

Tommy Sessions (00:02:22):

Well, that's getting close. That's awesome.

Joe McCarthy (00:02:23):

That's close.

Tommy Sessions (00:02:25):

We're basically in the preseason. Here we are. So let's talk about your preparation and even if it's something that maybe you wish you would prepare for.

Joe McCarthy (00:02:35):

Scouting for me is year round. I'm even scouting, while I'm hunting I'm scouting for next year. This could be it. we got an elk here, but that place up there was real was really cool. Onxmaps, Google Earth, the fish and game website map that they have on the hunt maps, all those maps, I am constantly using them when I'm in the field and making marks. So basically when season gets over and maybe it's too snowy to get back in places, I actually start going over the maps and looking for access points and where that elk might have gone to, or hey, it went this way and I can actually over years of pinning things, I can actually start seeing natural corridors where they move. Maybe you have a fire come in and it changes things and it moves elk somewhere else.

Joe McCarthy (00:03:25):

But I can literally see, this is where they went here. Now they're going over here. And you back the world up on a map and you can start seeing two different points. Then you can figure out, okay, this is what those elk are doing and how they move. So I'm doing that all the time.

Joe McCarthy (00:03:44):

When it comes to getting to this time of year, I get out on my feet in my truck, in my bike, in my four wheeler, however I can access some ground and I get out there and put boots on the ground, try to actually turn camping trips into hunting trips. If there's a 3D tournament somewhere, going up there and getting out on the time that you're not shooting in the tournament, you get up and go scout somewhere else. If you're going camping, try to put that in the same area that you're hunting and ultimately get out on the ground and follow some of those points and just covering ground.

Joe McCarthy (00:04:28):

Things are always changing between fires and logging. Just with people, having different access points or knowing ways to get around the mountain, really to me is almost more important than finding elk. If I look and find water and I find deep north-facing slopes, I can pretty much guess that there's elk going to be there. It's figuring out how to get there. If somebody else is in there on top of me, to the side of me and using background. So ultimately access everywhere is my kicking point, trying to figure out different ways to get around.

Tommy Sessions (00:05:12):

If you're out scouting in summer or even now, or a month before rut, or two weeks now, basically before pre-rut, what are you looking for? I've got cams set up right now and I've got cows on them. I haven't seen a bull on any of them yet. I know it's [inaudible 00:05:30] there. We know that a bull's going to come through there, but what are you looking for if you don't see cows on there? You got water you said, you got north facing slope.

Joe McCarthy (00:05:43):

Yeah. [inaudible 00:05:44] You'll see wallows. A wallow may not, it'll be grown over, but you can see an area where wallow is, or you can see old trees. Trees that have been raked before and that blaze that you'll get on the side of a tree. And you'll see that two, three years later, you'll see that tree sitting there with that blaze on it. And so seeing that stuff, there's units in Idaho, there's the 54 unit, the one that's so sought after. You go down there in August, you won't find elk. You won't see elk where you would see them during September because those elk are migrating and you'll see the cows come in early September and then really by the middle of the month, all of a sudden you're starting to see new elk coming in every day that are coming in out of Nevada. So I don't necessarily need to see elk when I'm elk hunting. I need to see wallows. I need to see cold areas. I need to see blazed trees, past examples of stuff, trails. That's the stuff I'm looking for.

Joe McCarthy (00:06:51):

The cameras are great. And if you're in an area where elk aren't moving a long distance finding cows, if you find cows, September, you're going to find bulls. The bulls will find them.

Tommy Sessions (00:07:06):

So when you Say cold areas, what do you mean by that? I don't know if everybody will pick up on that.

Joe McCarthy (00:07:12):

I look for areas that are wet and cold. September, it's 80 degrees outside or 85 degrees outside and you got these bare hillsides, but there will be cracks and crevices and places over hills and water draws where thermals are coming through that are cold. And those elk will go to those places. Elk actually burned more energy trying to stay cool in the summer than they do trying to stay warm in the winter. And so if you find a cold air, that's that whole north facing thing, you go north, because there's less sun on those north facing slopes. If you get into the cracks of those north facing slopes down into a place that's timbered and with really wet ground, if it's wet in September and it's cold down there, an elk's going to end up being there. They look for cold areas. It's just-

Tommy Sessions (00:08:09):

If you talk about blazing trees and so for other people rubs or whatever their terminology is on them, and that's actually how I, because I'm on a new unit this year. And that's how I found where to put this camera and I got cows on it now is old rubs. Historically in your experience, do you see that a bull, even if he got shot last year or whatever, and we don't know if he was the one or whatever, but will a new bull come into that area and rub those up in your experience or is that just that old bull's nest or whatever?

Joe McCarthy (00:08:48):

I think elk like, I'm not in the brain of an elk, but elk will be where elk were and whether it's that bull or a new bull, whatever drew that one bull to that same spot, there'll be an elk in that same spot next year, unless it's been logged, had a big fire or some major thing happen. You're going to have elk that go to those same places every year. There are places that I can go to, now I hunt all over the place and I'm not necessarily helping myself by going everywhere all over the state, although it's challenging, but there are places you can go to and stand on the exact same rock and bugle and you'll get the same response in the same spot as you did the last 10 years. My brother, he makes his world on that. He's very efficient because he remembers where elk we're year after year after year. He's hunted the same area over and over and over.

Joe McCarthy (00:09:46):

And literally you're not just bugling empty ground. You can go to this point where I bugled last year and the year before that. And the year before that, and there was an elk in that hole. Even if the elk doesn't respond, you still have confidence to the elk's there and you're going to go back there tomorrow and check it. So maybe that bull didn't bugle today, but he is tomorrow and your confidence level is going to help you stay after it and keep going back there, because you know that's where those elk are.

Tommy Sessions (00:10:15):

Makes sense. That's pretty deep, the elk are where they were.

Joe McCarthy (00:10:17):

Elk are where they were.

Tommy Sessions (00:10:21):

Philosophical there.

Joe McCarthy (00:10:23):

Yeah. Yep. I'm not the smartest guy.

Tommy Sessions (00:10:33):

So all right. We got scouting in. That gives us a break off point because we could go into scouting, into crazy amounts. There's whole podcasts and seminars and stuff on e-scouting, everything. We won't dive into that. So you got your scouting figured out, you got an area figured out on where you want to go. Now let's talk about your equipment. I already know that, because camping with you and shooting with you a little bit and that, you've already started breaking out your equipment, but let's talk about when do you start figuring out your equipment for say the 2022 season coming up? When did you start preparing for this one?

Joe McCarthy (00:11:14):

Yeah, so I actually like to shoot and I don't necessarily shoot completely competitive indoor stuff, but I like to shoot indoor and I keep shooting my stuff through the winter with indoor leagues and things like that you can stay active with. As 3D seasons come into place, then you're really testing stuff where you're actually walking, shooting up and down hills, making sure your first, second and third axises are all on your bubbles. If you're shooting with a movable site or any site, you're checking all that stuff as you go.

Joe McCarthy (00:11:48):

I think the biggest thing with my bow is that I do not want to put brand new strings or brand new gear or anything brand new on a bow right before hunting season. I want to shoot it in. And even the bow that I just got [inaudible 00:12:02], thank you, Bill, for the Matthews because it shoots really well. I'm out shooting the heck out of it right now because I do not want that bow to be brand new going in. I want those strings to be stretched in. I want to go out there. Ultimately shooting in the heat is bad on strings, but that's good for me because I have strings right now that are brand new and I would just as soon get the stretch now taken care of and be able to twist that and get that dialed in before season starts.

Joe McCarthy (00:12:30):

If you are fixing your equipment two weeks before the season, one, the archery plate dealer that is going to be doing your work is going to be pissed because that's when they're backlogged. But the other side of it is is you're going to go out there with new stuff and it's 90 degrees out hunting and you're bouncing around on your four wheeler and you're doing stuff. Your strings start to stretch over a little bit of time. That changes your anchor points. It changes everything. And now you're chasing stuff. Same thing with your sites, your pins. I have issues with vision and so making sure that my pins, I can shoot a pin in the dark and I can shoot a pin in the light. I don't want them too small. I don't want them too big.

Joe McCarthy (00:13:17):

And so I try to get that stuff done ahead of time. And know your equipment going into things. If you're buying a bow for hunting season, you should be doing that in March, because if you do it now, you really aren't going to be familiar with those pins and the nuances of this. You're going to draw your bow back when you've been shooting in a dark room or in a indoor facility. You're going to go out on a hillside with the sun blazing down and you're not going to be able to see any of your pins because the sun's going to wash it out. And so really getting for your shooting, your equipment in.

Joe McCarthy (00:13:49):

And I say the same with rifle. I do do a lot of rifle shooting. I have a friend of mine that's very proficient at shooting with a rifle and making sure you're testing that equipment out months in advance so that it's not new. When you go out there. The worst thing you can do is take new stuff out in the field, because you just don't know how it's going to react.

Billy Ayer (00:14:10):

I see a lot of people do that. They're putting on new scopes or new whatever, quivers, you name it. They're like, "Oh," and they see something that catches their eye and they're doing it a week or two before season. And I always cringe at that. I'm like, "Ugh."

Joe McCarthy (00:14:26):

No, it's the same. Honestly the same with our bugle tubes and our reeds and all that stuff. Buy that stuff early, play with it, use it, break it in, figure out what's the nuances with it so you're good at it, versus that right before time. Reeds take time to break in. I don't know if there's a company that makes a reed that's perfect when it comes out of the box. They seem to wear in. It's just the nature of latex. Boots, don't buy brand new boots a week before season. They're going to get wet. They're going to get trashed. You're going to be walking up and down hills. And if they're not broke in, your feet are going to get broken, and honestly your feet, your boots are probably your best equipment, because once your feet get trashed, good luck. You're not going to chase elk, unless you can shoot one off the four wheeler.

Billy Ayer (00:15:16):

Yeah. We have a guy from Tennessee coming in to film some elk hunts with us and he asked me, "What equipment do I need?" And it's fairly flat. Everything that he haunts, he's a waterfall hunter, never elk hunted. And one thing I said is, "Make sure you have good boots and make sure you've hiked 15, 20, 25 miles in rugged terrain before you bring them out."

Joe McCarthy (00:15:39):

And Tom, so obviously retired law enforcement, Tommy you're retired law enforcement. You wear boots all the time. And a good pair of boots versus a bad pair of boots, there is a difference. If you're buying a $99 pair of boots versus a $500 pair of boots, there is a difference. Now when I was 25 years old, I didn't have the money and you just do what you got to do. In fact, actually I wore my turf shoes from when I played at BSU. BSU gave me shoes, I had a stock pile of turf shoes and that's what I wore because I was broke. But as you can afford boots, you wear the best boot you can. Forgo your clothing. Don't want to be making enemies with Kryptek or KUIU or whatever company that has camo you like, but your boots, you need to spend your money on your boots. Ultimately clothes, I will say that those higher brand companies, some of that equipment is very good. I've worn the same pairs of pants now for years and what? It takes a licking and so I am, tough band, $300, $400 for a outfit for hunting. But you what? If the stuff lasts, that's great versus going out and stepping over a deadfall and blowing the crotch out of your pants. That sucks. Boots are primary.

Tommy Sessions (00:17:11):

I want to take advantage of this because you're an anomaly when it comes to elk calls and reeds and everything like that. And obviously Slayer Calls manufacture reeds now and bugle tubes, the Enchantress. And I had the opportunity to stretch a reed out during a competition in Stanley. And I probably could have looked at that before I went up there. The whole day it was blowing great, but I probably could have had signs of that before I went up there and actually looked at that reed or maybe felt it or something, but I didn't. I was caught in the moment or whatever and got up there and my reed completely stretched out because I'd used it so much and blew it out and I couldn't get the highs. I sound like maybe a calf trying to bugle or something like that. That's about what I could get out of it.

Joe McCarthy (00:18:04):

The thing is, if you do call well, it's sad if it happen at a competition. You do call well. And competitions are competitions.

Tommy Sessions (00:18:12):

Yeah. If you look at a reed and I've got my reeds here, if you were to take and look at this reed, this one is pretty new. So it's not blown out or anything like that. And it's really not even broke in, but is there a spot on reeds? Let's say I'm getting my gear list together and I'm looking through my reeds and I look at one and I go, "Oh man, that one can go in my pack for a backup, but I want to have a reed, if I'm five hours packed in, I don't want to have to go callless or only do a mouth external call or something. Are there signs of that is what I'm trying to get out, I guess?

Joe McCarthy (00:18:55):

Well, I think the signs are more in the weight, the tones in which you're getting and what you're feeling in the mouth. And it depends on your style of calling. I personally don't mind a little wrinkle in my latex because I'll use the air pressure and my tongue pressure to take that out. And I actually like a soft latex to be able to run through a wider range of sounds or pitches. When you stretch a call, you can't unstretch a call. So whatever you stretch that reed up and the more stretch you add, the higher the pitch goes, when you bring that up high like that, you can't undo. You can't get down here. So depending on who you are, some people, if they're using their tongue where they need that stretch in the reed, then that's different. So it depends on where you're at.

Joe McCarthy (00:19:45):

But ultimately it's a feel. You're going to feel the latex start to go and it starts to fade. And honestly, the worst thing that can happen and it happens all the time is in the car. If you're late, if your reeds are stored in your car, anywhere in the car, doesn't even matter if they're hiding in the glove box or whatever, cars get so damn hot, they cook the latex and it cooks the glue in that holds it all together. And ultimately it causes slippage. And that's, I think across the board. There's not a manufacturer anywhere that's got a reed right now that can survive heat.

Billy Ayer (00:20:27):

I leave my stuff in the car, leave it out in the garage. It's usually in my pack with a bunch of pine needles and lint and everything else. And then I pull them out and they're trash. So I usually get new ones every single year.

Joe McCarthy (00:20:41):

Yeah. Another thing. One, I have reeds right now from last year I store in the fridge. My wife is patient enough with me that where the butter sits, there may be a little baggie of reeds in there. That cool dark is definitely going to help it. Any cool air is going to keep your latex firmer. It's not going to get loose on you. The other thing is there is bacteria in your mouth. So when you're putting those reeds in and out of your mouth all the time, the bacteria in your mouth will be on that latex. And if that sits for periods of time, it can actually start degrading the latex as well. And so with that, I will take a little bottle of Scope out, Scope or Listerine or whatever company you want to use, but dipping the reeds in that, not submerging them to where they're floating around in there, but putting a little antiseptic on the actual latex to kill that bacteria, and that will actually prevent them as well.

Joe McCarthy (00:21:46):

I guess go back to with the visual thing, too, when you're looking at the reeds, you can start to see cracking and you'll see it so that the frame, the horseshoe, and you'll start to see cracking. And some of that cracking comes from being wet, drying, wet, drying, wet, drying, in the truck, heat, all that stuff. And you'll start to see cracking along the edge of that frame. And so if you see that, then that's an issue then obviously you want to be getting rid of those reeds. Reeds are disposable. You might be able to get through a season with one or two reeds, but they're disposable. And honestly, sometimes we have found over the years when you get some kind of a imperfection, all of a sudden it makes a better sound. And then I'm trying to copy that when we're actually making reeds, because it's like, "Hey, you know what? I got that little split right here. That seemed to make a different sound."

Joe McCarthy (00:22:44):

But obviously you start seeing cracks in the latex, it's probably not going to last much longer. And the thing about a contest is contests, you're really throwing everything out there, putting a hundred percent of what you do in there. And the reeds, you can sit at home and practice with them all day long and you make great sounds, but on the stage you get up there and you throw it all in there and then that little crack or that little imperfection breaks. And that sucks.

Tommy Sessions (00:23:13):

Absolutely, been there. Yeah. Well you're no slouch either on the whole fitness game. I remember. So when I worked around you, I was like, "Man, this dude, he's got some age on him, but this guy will rock somebody." And I-

Billy Ayer (00:23:28):

I've rode motorcycles with him, Tommy. I've seen him push his bike up a 500 yard straight up and down mountain.

Tommy Sessions (00:23:35):

Yeah. Yeah. Well, you're supposed to ride those Joe. You don't have to push a dirt bike. You can ride it.

Joe McCarthy (00:23:40):

Yeah. My motorcycle skills are maybe not... Could be the fact my bike is [inaudible 00:23:49]. I have a little popup bike. I'l tell you, riding a bike is a physical thing, too. Anybody that thinks that you're riding a bike into some place like it's going to be some easy thing. That is BS. Riding a motorcycle, unless you're on the Greenbelt in Boise, is a athletic event. You need to be in shape to ride a bike. Those guys that do all the motocross stuff, they're in phenomenal shape. They make it look so easy, but it's because they're in great shape.

Tommy Sessions (00:24:18):

Yeah. So what do you for seasons to stay in shape, Joe?

Joe McCarthy (00:24:21):

You know what? Elk season starts in September. So literally I follow my football. So again, I played football through high school and college. My son, Cody, he does okay in the elk bugling world, too. He played football through college and football starts in September. That's when game day start. So I literally will train the same way I did in college, in that there's periodization. So when I come out of the season, I will rest a little bit. I will say, during the season, it's like a game. Don't short yourself on calories. Don't short yourself on any food. Get as much food into you. It doesn't matter what... If you're gaining weight during elk season, then you're probably doing something right, because that's probably not going to happen.

Joe McCarthy (00:25:14):

But once you're out of that, there's a recovery session. You need to recover. Then I transition my workouts from being obviously during the elk season, it's more endurance based. I will then start working myself into more of a strength phase. And I rotate that through every three to four months to where I'm getting to where I'm at now, where I'm down to, I'm really concentrating more on power, explosiveness and then really transitioning some of that also into mobility, shoulder mobility, ankle mobility, hip mobility. People miss that and doing all that warm up, stretching, that stuff, that is super important because ultimately sitting in a weight room and lifting and doing stuff like that or going out and running, doing all that, it's great to have strength, but you have to have functional strength.

Joe McCarthy (00:26:13):

When you jump off a rock and you land on unstable soil, you need your ankle to be able to react to that, your knee to react to that, your hips to react to that, so you don't get hurt. You need to have some flexibility in those muscles and tendons that will allow some flexing and some stretching, so that if you fall and get out of balance, that you can sustain yourself. Especially in my case, there's a lot of people that pack really light and do that. I don't. My law enforcement experience, I'm a redundant mechanisms guy. I now have two bows. I had two bows. Had one, now with Bill, I have two bows again. When I rifle hunt, I take two rifles, Wilders, fires, whatever, I'm redundant.

Joe McCarthy (00:27:04):

So in my backpack, I carry actually probably a lot of weight. My unloaded backpack probably weighs 50 pounds daily that I'm carrying around. And that's unloaded. That's just my day pack, because I'm taking in extra stuff for cleaning the animal. I'm taking in extra stuff in case I stab myself and there's some a medical emergency and I'm taking in more than just gauze. I want to be able to splint a knee or something if you tear a knee or brace it or something like a tourniquet. I think tourniquets anymore, after my work in law enforcement, a friend of mine getting shot and being saved with a tourniquet, that kind of stuff. I don't skimp on any of that stuff.

Joe McCarthy (00:27:51):

And I truly believe that my fitness and that allows me to carry that extra weight. Now, carrying that extra weight, walking on ground, again goes back to the mobility thing. I want to be able to be strong through my ranges of motion. And so where I used to do a lot more stuff in football with squats, double leg, how much weight can you lift? Now it's more like I'm doing single leg squats, pistol squats, leg out front, a lot of instant stability stuff left and right, a lot of movement drills, trying to get that full range of motion things going and getting that strength through the whole range of... I don't care about the actual weight number that's in there, as long as it's taxing me and I'm doing it through a full range of motion, because I think that's where we get hurt and we fall down and we get outside that range of motion. And then all of a sudden you're in a weak spot and that's where you blow an knee or twist an ankle or whatever.

Tommy Sessions (00:28:47):

Yeah. I think that an emergency preparedness kit is huge. I think it's very overlooked too. Say from law enforcement days, we were trained on using tourniquets and some tach med type stuff. And that is one thing that may have made it out of my patrol car and into my pack was a tourniquet and some other first aid items. But that was definitely the one, because I figured if either somebody stabs a broadhead or I stab a broadhead, it comes out of my quiver and slices me or whatever, we want to use the sharpest broadheads possible. That could be either hit an artery or cut super deep. And we're five miles back in, I would rather get a tourniquet on it, get it bandaged up as good as I can and limp my way out to the truck. So those are-

Joe McCarthy (00:29:42):

Having something with bee sting kits, I just think of it again, going back from the law enforcement thing. It's not just for me, it's for your partner or let's face it, we hunt around other people. You're not ever going to get away from people. And so whoever else is out there, somebody else gets a bee sting. Things like headaches, so I have Tylenol, Benadryl, different types of meds like that in there. Because Cody is diabetic I carry different kinds of sugar things to help him. And I've been in, face it, elk hunting, going up and down hills, it taxes you. So you get into a position where you're diabetic and you're low on sugar, you need that.

Joe McCarthy (00:30:27):

Even non-diabetic, you walk and you're exhausted. I carry the little suck bags. I call them suck bags, the little bags of fluid like little kids drink, the little juice bags, carry that stuff. Apple sauce in the bags. Carry all that stuff with me all the time. It's not a sometimes thing. I carry that all the time. I keep food like that available because the reality is you get out and you do shoot something. You need to have the ability to stay there and get it done. And food, shelter, having blankets, things like that. I keep tarps in my stuff. Some of it ultimately is to lay meat out so it doesn't get dirty. But it's also, if I get stuck out there, I can throw a tarp up with some string and some para cord and I can make a makeshift tent and I'll sleep out there.

Joe McCarthy (00:31:22):

I look at the situation with Cory and Donny on the Elk 101, when they're up there in Alaska, what a deal. They went from beautiful weather to the next day, really bad weather where they're dealing with cold and wet and those are tough conditions and that can become life changing. So having food gives you warmth, blankets give you warmth. Having that ability to, if you get stuck somewhere, to be able to stay the night, that's a good thing.

Joe McCarthy (00:31:56):

It also leads up to my inReach. I wear an inReach and run it every day I'm hunting. I charge it when I get back, but I will run that thing with the tracker thing on, so my wife can actually sit at home on this computer that I'm talking on now, and she will literally track me around and where I'm at. Very important, I think, that people know where you're at. You can send out a message, those kind of things. Being on the law enforcement side where I've responded to some of that stuff, if you don't have some way to get the message out, that's how people die. So those inReaches right now, there's no excuse to be out in the woods without one.

Tommy Sessions (00:32:37):

So that actually brings up a really good point that this wasn't ever thought about, but it's huge, because I'm looking at maybe solo hunting this year on a few days, at minimum a few days, maybe the whole season. We'll see, but you brought it up. What do you tell Shelly? Or what do you tell Cody or whoever? Or how many people do you tell at a minimum? What's your protocol? If you're going to go up to the woods solo, in your opinion, obviously this is all opinion, but what are best practices? So in case you go up to Kootenai County or you go to [inaudible 00:33:14] County or whatever, the Sheriff's Department or search and rescue is going to have the best possibilities of finding you.

Joe McCarthy (00:33:21):

Yeah. So teaching at the Police Academy in Idaho where I'm hunting, I tend to know people where the counties I'm hunting in. For example, this May I was hunting, doing some guiding for Boulder Creek Outfitters out of Whitebird. I told Scott Sumter, who's the resident deputy there in Riggins, "Hey, this is where I'm at. I got an inReach. I'll keep in touch with you," et cetera, et cetera. And I get a phone call from him saying, "Hey dude, we got an inReach beacon going off. Is this you?"

Joe McCarthy (00:33:50):

And I'm like, "Nope, not me." But I'm telling him who it is. Now you may not have that opportunity to be able to talk to a resident deputy or something like that. But telling your wife, when I run, I literally, the inReach thing runs the tracker. It'll send out a location where I'm at every 10 minutes while I'm out in the woods walking around. Now if I decide to park it for a little bit, I'll turn it off to save my battery. I carry a large charging battery to make sure I can keep it charged if I stay out away from my truck or trailer for a bit of time. But I keep that thing charged and I keep it running.

Joe McCarthy (00:34:30):

My wife, I can text her and tell her, "Hey, where I'm at right here, I just Googled in a six point. You come up tomorrow, this is where we're going." And she literally can look at that on the map and literally know, see the trail I walked and the whole thing to where when I meet her the next day, and this actually did happen last year, she shows up and I take her up that trail. It's like she's been there before. But the deal with that is that she can literally look in real time where I'm at right now. And it has the ability to send out a beacon, that sends a beacon to the nearest 911. If you can't talk, you just push that button. It sends that out and it gives your lat-long and helicopter comes in and gets you. That stuff is really important. I keep my phone with me with Onx on it, but I keep that-

Billy Ayer (00:35:27):

Joe, you carry the smaller inReach. Just for the audience. How much does something like that cost?

Joe McCarthy (00:35:33):

I think they're a couple hundred bucks. They're 300 bucks I think.

Billy Ayer (00:35:37):

Call it 300 bucks. And the peace of mind of your loved ones, knowing that they know where you're at is one thing. It's a small price for 300 bucks, but you just never know when something's going to happen. It's like a car wreck. You don't expect it to happen. It just happens so fast. Right? So for 300 bucks, it's a small price for a huge insurance.

Joe McCarthy (00:36:01):

The cool thing with the mini now is, we bought the big one from my son before the mini came out. So he has to text on that, but the mini Bluetooth to your phone and then it really is just like texting on your regular plan. it's limited on how many characters you can use and it's not real time as fast as your plan, but you text on your phone just like you would a message anywhere else. And it sends it out through the mini and you get out wherever you need to get out.

Tommy Sessions (00:36:35):

That big one will also, I know from experience, I hooked one up to a guy's phone two years ago, the big one will actually hook into your phone as a Bluetooth now, too. So you can use the big one just like the mini.

Joe McCarthy (00:36:48):

That's cool, because the big one was the whole texting. Have to go up the ladder to find H and then you go down the letter to find I. Then you got to find a space and you got to move it that way. So it took a lot of time to do where your phone just riffs it right out. I carry my Onx, my phone. I am on that thing all the time. Every time I leave camp or leave the road, I run my tracker on that as well. I follow that around so I know where I'm at. It helps me figure, put points together. And then I also, because I have my phone, I'm using it to Bluetooth to the mini. And I carry that stuff now. That is going to come go with me every time I go out hunting.

Billy Ayer (00:37:36):

Yeah, the Onxmap on our phone, we were in a place where there was no cell phone coverage. Luckily my buddy downloaded the offline map, but we got twisted up one night. We got in some elk and we hunted into the dark, and coming back, we got a little twisted and lost, really lost in the middle of nowhere and the wind kicked up and it got cold. And that thing saved us from having a cold night up on the hill.

Joe McCarthy (00:38:00):

I worked search and rescue, first couple Sheriff's offices I worked up north, dealt with a guy that walked in circles. He literally walked in the same circle three times before he died in the wintertime. A friend of mine, Lance Sellers, another guy who's really quite proficient at elk hunting. The two of us and my wife, she won't let us forget it. But we literally walked down after shooting a bull, trying to walk back out to the road and we missed, the roads got to be here. Right? It's got to be there. We literally paralleled the road about 20 yards, paralleling it the whole way down, which is that's the brushiest part of the thing. If we had just had the Onx back then, you would know the road is right there and you just go to the road. And instead we spent 40 minutes crashing through brush that we didn't have to.

Joe McCarthy (00:38:47):

So it just makes it so much easier when you can see points and you can download those maps, so that even when you don't have service, they're there and you can look at the satellite map. You can look at a hybrid satellite Topo. You can look at the Topo. I like all three, cause they all have their own advantages. But when there's this thing marked that this is where I'm going and I can get to a road and that gets me out a lot easier, that just keeps seeing the field longer because you're not burning energy.

Tommy Sessions (00:39:19):

Absolutely. We're getting a little bit limited, but let's talk about field preparation of animals. And I know we talked about this last time a little bit on our podcast with Bill's. Ultimately we as hunters, our ultimate goal is to harvest something. If not to go out there and just play Rambo and just savage, get 20 elk on the ground in a season and go on to kill something else, to get that one bull, one cow, one buck, whatever it is that you're hunting and process that animal and bring it back to feed your family throughout the year, like you talked about with your grandparents. It was subsidy. It was their way of life, how they ate, how they fed the family.

Tommy Sessions (00:40:09):

I feel the same way now as that's how I feed my family with the meat that I get from an elk. And so when I'm super blessed to have a bull down, I do every possible thing I can to not spoil any of it. And sometimes it happens and it's the worst gut feeling you ever have, but how do you prepare it and try to ensure that you're not going to spoil anything?

Joe McCarthy (00:40:35):

So one, I think it all starts preparation. Whenever I'm hunting an elk, every step I take going towards an elk, the elk's moving left, right, up, down, wherever, I am worried where that elk is going. Can I get it out? I'm thinking about getting it out from the time that I'm e-scouting. I'm looking at a hole going, "Can I get this out?" So if I can't get it out, can couple of us get it out? And then you start looking at what resources you have. I've been in a situation lucky enough where we've shot one nice bull and sitting on the one bull, another bull just comes right in while we're sitting on the other bull. The idea of shooting two bulls, yeah, you could shoot two bulls, but it's just me and my wife and trying to pack this out. Can we get that out in a timely manner? And going, "No." I really am not. Maybe I could've, but the chances of that happening where I would leave some spoilage become, at some point you got to go wave it. No, I shouldn't do this.

Joe McCarthy (00:41:34):

And then the rally was, my wife had killed a nice five and this big six and then five point was making all the big, rough growling noises. Sounded like he was the king. And so she shoots it and the little spike comes in and that spike's actually a six point that is probably a 320, 330 bull. And it's like, holy crud. And he is standing there at 30 yards, but we're back in a place and it's just me and my wife. And I'm like, "Yeah, we can't take that." So you have to make some decisions at some point when you're hunting. Can I do this?

Joe McCarthy (00:42:06):

Once we decide to make the shot and you're going to take it out though, I do kind of a hybrid. I talked to a friend of mine, Andy Desarno. He runs a butcher shop in Boise called Get Your Meat. And I got to work with him some last year. He helped me with cutting meat. I've cut my own meat for quite a while. But being around a guy that cuts a lot of meat, you always can learn something. So working with him and seeing some elk that did come in, I'm a big fan of the gutless method. I like that method. However, when you do that, the side that's laying down is not necessarily cooling. And reality is on a hot day, the ground may not be cool either. So where you're at, that could be making it worse.

Joe McCarthy (00:42:52):

So I like a hybrid type thing. Now if you shoot it a nice, cool draw where you can take your time, great. Do that. The bull my son killed last year, it was in a crack down by some water and it allowed us to actually use the gutless method and actually able to cape the whole elk out because we were in nice, cool draw, where we were able to really slowly process things. But in a lot of other areas where you kill something out in the flat where it's hot and it's 80 degrees or you killed it at 9:00 and now it's 2:00 and it's 90 degrees out, you don't have that kind of time. So making an incision into the guts, trying to get some of that heat out, I don't care if I take all the guts out or not. I just want to get heat out of the animal.

Joe McCarthy (00:43:41):

If it means actually taking a knife on one side and splitting the meat down to the bone to get some heat out, doing something of that nature first and then going back through and doing the gutless method. I like the gutless method just because the quarters come off real easy. I bone out all everything else really nice and easy. But at some point you got to look at it going, it's too hot right now. The priority one is to try to get this animal cooled out. And so actually gutting it, even though you're doing the gutless method, gutting it is going to take heat out of that animal and in doing it. So I have no issues with doing a hybrid where I'm doing them both.

Joe McCarthy (00:44:22):

Now when I'm doing both, does that mean you got to get clear up and get all the stuff out of the lungs or pull air? I know I just want to get enough stuff out of there that air can get into the cavities and start cooling things off. And especially, guys that are trophy hunting and taking capes, you take a cape, for me, I try to be careful when I'm caping something out. That takes time. And so if you're going to be caping an animal, my suggestion is to not just do the full gutless or gutless method, but actually try to gut the animal out, more conventional style to where you can actually let the animal cool down from the inside out and buy yourself that time.

Joe McCarthy (00:45:08):

I don't necessarily think exterior heat is as bad as interior heat. And what I mean by that is everybody complains about 90 degree days, which are bad, but 90 degree days don't let the interior of the animal cool down. And that's the part that you need to let that inside cool down, so you're not radiating that heat from the inside out out with all the bacteria and everything that goes on. That's part of the dying process is blood starts to slow down and bacteria starts forming and that stuff.

Joe McCarthy (00:45:38):

I will say this too. I carry, there's a bug spray stuff and there's all sorts of ways to do it, but I carry again, part of that 50 pounds, I carry at least in my backpack, I carry a spray that tries to eliminate bacteria and bugs as well so flies don't touch things. I will say it's not perfect. I'd say it probably eliminates 80%, but 80% is 80%. And again, this goes back to that, we're back to processing animal. Your safety kit, make making sure where bandages are, because when the knife slips and you stab yourself, having some way to clean that out because now you not only have a hole in you, but you have other blood that can in fear with that, which can cause blood poisoning. Having water to wash that out, preparing the stuff ahead of time so if you do have an injury.

Joe McCarthy (00:46:28):

And again, bees, bees are an issue. If you have an issue with being stung, having some Benadryl. I'm not completely allergic, but I have reactions to bees. So I make sure I carry Benadryl when I'm processing now.

Tommy Sessions (00:46:44):

Does that spray that you use, do you spray your bags after you hang them or anything like that? Does that keep them away too?

Joe McCarthy (00:46:52):

Uh-huh.

Tommy Sessions (00:46:52):

Because I've never even heard of that.

Joe McCarthy (00:46:55):

Some of the bags we have, I have all kinds of bags because that's one of the things postseason I deal with is trying to figure out which bags I'm keeping, which ones I'm getting rid of. Some of them will actually have that antimicrobial stuff in it, which helps. But again helps. That spray seems to, it does seem to work. And I think when you can stop bacteria from doing its thing, that buys you time. Vinegar, you can carry vinegar and all that stuff too. That's the old way of doing it. Just go for 10 bucks, you go buy the can. It makes it a whole lot easier.

Billy Ayer (00:47:33):

So Joe, now you got a 50 pound pack that you brought in. You got a 700, 800 pound animal on the ground. How much do you put on your back to safely carry out?

Joe McCarthy (00:47:43):

I take about 90 to a 100 pounds. My pack is heavy and last year the reality is, Cody and I took out that entire elk in two trips. It's a lot of weight, but again, that's that fitness level things. I train to be explosive, to be able to carry weight. That is why I train and why I do some of the stuff I do. I'm not the Cameron Hanes. I'm not going to run 36 miles a day. That is not me, but I can go from point A to point B, depending on where it's at. Maybe it's only 10 yards, maybe it's 400 yards. I will go to that place. Stop and rest, recover. Just like doing power cleans. You'd do a set of 10 power cleans and then you rest do another set of 10 power cleans, you rest. I get my body into that kind of shape where I can go up a hill, rest, up a hill rest. Cameron Hanes, all power to him. He likes to run 36 miles a day. I can't do that. That's not me.

Joe McCarthy (00:48:43):

And honestly it's not, I want to be able to carry, I want to have that power to be able to power up a hill and then I take a rest. And again, I'm making sure I'm drinking, hydrating all that the whole time. My wife has issue with cramping up with sodium, magnesium things. We make sure I take pickle juice, literally I carry pickle juice with me in jars because that helps me with cramping.

Joe McCarthy (00:49:11):

So my backpack, when I'm walking around in the woods is full. I don't travel light.

Billy Ayer (00:49:16):

I got to go with you. I got to start stuffing stuff in there. Take some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, some trail mix and stuff in your pack.

Joe McCarthy (00:49:22):

No. It's the way it is. But it's one of those things. It's not a race. And that's the part of the thing. Getting stuff out isn't a race. If you can get things processed well and hung up to where it dries out, then you have time. Obviously you don't have a lot, you're not going to take days, but you have time. Take your time, rest, get in and out. If you're hydrating and eating enough food or enough sugars in your drinks or whatever you're doing to keep you going, that's going to keep you going. The first thing that comes out are the hind quarters. That's the first thing that comes out is going to be hind quarters. Now if my wife's with me, she'll probably take a front shoulder because she can't necessarily, maybe isn't going to carry a full hind quarter, but I'll take high quarters and backs straps. And I'll load that up as heavy as I can and I make progress out. And then I go back in and we'll just keep doing that until it's over.

Joe McCarthy (00:50:23):

And my stutter stuff, that 50 pounds of stuff I carry with me, I leave it. It sits. I take only the necessities with me and I leave that other stuff in there. And then I go in the very last is to pick up my stuff and clean stuff I don't need. I don't need knives. I don't need some of that other stuff in my pack. I just don't need that going out. So I leave it in the pack and I just use the frame part and carry as much as I can out with it. And then like I said, the last part, you just go back in and grab your stuff.

Tommy Sessions (00:50:57):

So in Idaho, I think actually, and you guys correct me if I'm wrong, but I think in the regulations, it says that largest piece of meat has to come out first or something along those lines. It's not exact, but I've seen it a couple times where people get into super deep, nasty holes and up in the Sawtooth unit and where it's really rocky, nasty, 1,500 feet, 2,000 feet of elevation game back to the top and they'll bring out the antlers and then realize what mess they just got themselves into.

Joe McCarthy (00:51:34):

Antlers stay.

Tommy Sessions (00:51:36):

Yeah, absolutely, hundred percent.

Joe McCarthy (00:51:38):

That's the last thing to come out is antlers and cape. That is the last thing to come out. Because everything else comes out first. People want to come out, show those antlers, great. But you got to get the meat out first.

Tommy Sessions (00:51:50):

Yep, absolutely. What do you do if you are in that situation, you've got a nasty hole or maybe you came out at, you shot it early evening and you were coming, you got back to camp at 2:00, 3:00 in the morning. What do you do with the meat that you just... You're not going to sit there and do a train all night long probably. You may rest for a little while and then come back in. So that meat sitting on the mountains out of a cooler or out of something for-

Joe McCarthy (00:52:20):

Hanging it.

Tommy Sessions (00:52:20):

What do you do?

Joe McCarthy (00:52:20):

Yeah, I'm hanging it in there. I will hang it up. I don't leave it on the ground. I find a tree, find something and hang it. I've talked about this with other people where they didn't have trees, where they actually made a little triangle thing where they hung stuff in that. But I hang all my meat. Everything gets hung up in there before I hit my first trip out. Five years ago I shot the elk actually in a place would've been perfect for him to die and instead he ran out to a big face. And so we ended up packing him over into a draw where I knew there'd be some thermals. And I again set him up in a tree in those thermals and set up that up to where that can keep. Meat hanging can keep for actually quite a while, as long as it's not too thick in the bone. If it's really thick enough, in the hind quarters, I'll split that meat down to the actual femur and try to let you know air in there to try to cool that out before I hang it. I will hang it.

Joe McCarthy (00:53:27):

And I, again carry. I have rope, old rope and when I use rope, that's rope is gone. I'm done with it. like I'll chop it up into whatever pieces I use it. And then when I'm done, I pack it out and I throw it away and I get new rope. Everything gets hung up.

Tommy Sessions (00:53:44):

So you don't bone out then. You leave it on the bone?

Joe McCarthy (00:53:48):

Oh, no. I've bone out. I've done the bone out thing. I think it hangs better on the bone because you can actually attach it to a tendon and hang it in a tree better that way. It's harder, takes more bags, bone meat, just because there's nothing holding the meat up and you got gravity pulling on those bags. I like the bone myself. It is extra weight. I have boned elk. In fact, we boned out a moose down in Kelly Creek. It was my brother-in-law who just passed. He shot it. And man, moose is a big animal. And we boned it out and took it out in trips. And we did all that.

Joe McCarthy (00:54:30):

ut I tried to keep things on the bone just because it's easier to pack and it's easier for me to hang. Like I said, I don't mind splitting it. I'll definitely split the hind quarter. So usually front shoulders, you don't really have to worry about that so much, but the hind quarters, big hind quarters, yeah, I'll split, but again, hind quarters are the first thing I'm taking out. And if I'm hunting with somebody that's got the ability to take out a hind quarter, I will. I've actually packed two hind quarters out at one time, that big bull my son killed in 54. And I actually put both hind quarters on that.

Billy Ayer (00:55:10):

He might've told me the story about that. Is this where you fell on his leg and then he threw the pack down and it rolled down the hill.

Joe McCarthy (00:55:15):

No, that's a different, that's up north. And we did. He had both hind quarters. I had both front shoulders and the back straps and the neck meat. And we were going straight downhill and I fell on, yeah, I did. I totally turfed it going over. You're trying go downhill over a deadfall. And I was behind him and I tried to go down off that deadfall and slipped and I just took him out and we tumbled down the hill together. How we didn't get hurt, I don't know. But yeah, he took the packs off and just threw them down the hill, because it was pretty steep.

Billy Ayer (00:55:54):

At Friday we're at Everly Stock and he said it was one of their packs. And he said, when it landed 20 feet down the hill, it landed perfect right on the frame standing up, so he just had to walk up to it, put it on his back and keep going.

Joe McCarthy (00:56:07):

It's true, too. I don't know if it's just the way because the meat way it was sitting, but the way the meat sat, and then it's going downhill, the straps actually were facing downhill. So he just went back, sat down underneath it, strapped it up and then he goes. And he's so damn strong. He's stupid strong. He just picks that stuff up and walks. But up there in that panhandle country, it can get steep and it's not only steep, it's timber steep. So you're crawling over deadfalls and all this other stuff. Again, that whole train to hunt thing.

Joe McCarthy (00:56:40):

Now again, this is where you have to, when it comes to animals, if you aren't fit enough to do that, don't do it. Go somewhere else. There's other ways to hunt. My brother is the king of calling elk right to the road and he thinks I'm stupid for hauling elk out from the mountains. He's like, "Yeah, we call it right to the truck. That's why you have a bugle." He goes, "You make tubes. Why don't you try using one and call it the truck?" That's the way he treats me. I get to hunt with him this year.

Tommy Sessions (00:57:12):

Grizzlies are, I mean in Southern Idaho, grizzlies are a big deal. So in your experience, what have you done with those?

Joe McCarthy (00:57:22):

Well, pretty hard. I mean grizzly is the, he's the apex predator out there. We're a subsection I think. We're 1/B, where that grizzly, he gets to 1A. I try to, again, hang stuff up. Try to get it out of the way, although the reality is the freaking bear will just tear a tree down to get stuff out of the way. The panhandle up where I hunt up north, there are grizzlies up there in the St. Joe and Couer d'Alene, well they come out of Montana over from Glacier National Park. You do, you can try to keep stuff. I don't know if there's a real foolproof way to deal with bears. Bears are bears. I try to give bears a wide girth, deal with them that way. And they're just one of those things.

Joe McCarthy (00:58:09):

I will say this. I will carry my meat away from the gut pile. And that has actually worked. Situation, my wife again, I sent my wife back to go back and retrieve some of my stuff after I'd got the elk out. I took the parts and pieces away from the gut pile. And when she went back up there to where the gut pile was, the bear was still there. And so that didn't make her real happy. A lot of times, those bears, the scent and that is going to really be that gut pile, the hide, all that stuff. That can be a diversionary thing. If you move your meat upwind of that, or no, I'm sorry, the other way. Downwind of that, so that the bear, when he is there smelling the gut pile, doesn't smell your actual meat. You're probably better off.

Joe McCarthy (00:59:02):

I think separating that, and I'm talking separating maybe 50 yards, 7,500 yards, but anywhere, just moving it away from that. Usually a bear's going to hit that gut pile and they'll probably be okay and be satisfied. Hopefully, like I said, but bear's a bear. Bears win.

Tommy Sessions (00:59:22):

So typically where I'm hunting with no grizzlies in the area, usually you can pee around your meat. You can leave some clothes or do whatever, get some human scent. Grizzlies don't necessarily care about that. Or do they when the person is not there, do they care? Or are they just like, I'm the king?

Joe McCarthy (00:59:43):

My thing is I just default to them. I think they are the king personally. That's why they eat people in Montana. They just as soon eat you as the elk. So I'm not sure they have that fear. It's not a bad idea leaving something that smells of people if the bears are... Areas where bears are hunted, bears, I think learn that, hey, people are bad and they're going to kill me. So they run away from them, but a grizzly is not really scared of people because we don't hunt them. Until we stand up and teach him hey, you shouldn't be messing with me, I don't think that's going to change.

Tommy Sessions (01:00:27):

Yeah. My pack, I think just went to 50 pounds just because I bought a Glock 20, a 10 mil for hunting in grizzly country. So now I'm front heavy walking through the woods.

Joe McCarthy (01:00:37):

Oh, I know. I've carried my .45. Again, I'm not necessarily always been in grizzly country. This is the one thing with guns though. I look at the gun, the gun doesn't have to kill the animal. It just has to discourage it and make it go away. The gun thing I think is a good, when you're in bear country, having a gun is good. Obviously you carried pepper spray with you in your career. I carried it my career, I got trained with it, got sprayed with it. We went through all the different things you have to go through to carry pepper spray. And I think when people buy pepper spray and go out in the woods and think that they've got this thing all figured out, just any deployment of pepper spray, no matter what happens, whoever's around it is going to get sprayed.

Tommy Sessions (01:01:23):

Yeah. Disclaimer, I think that everybody should spray themselves with pepper spray before they go. But don't say that we did it.

Joe McCarthy (01:01:28):

Yeah.

Tommy Sessions (01:01:28):

It's like down for the count and you're not in the fight anymore. It's a pretty wild deal.

Joe McCarthy (01:01:34):

My deal with the bear is I would rather have my gun and shoot it, which I practice with all the time, get to go bang, bang, bang. It's a fun thing than to have something that you use, maybe you do practice. Maybe somebody does practice with it once a year. You're going to practice with a gun a lot more. The issue is once you deploy that pepper spray, you're now fighting... The bear's got spray, but so do you. Now you've got to fight the bear with pepper spray in your face. And again, we did that with the red man suits and we learned, try to fight through it. But I think people get a little bold thinking that this pepper spray is going to do this big trick. I've sprayed lots of animals doing different types of tactical stuff. Working as a rural deputy, spraying a brahma bull north of Potlatch, Idaho. It takes a bit for that stuff to work on animals. And I don't know. If you spray it and the bear runs away, the bear probably wasn't that committed anyway.

Tommy Sessions (01:02:39):

Well let's not find out.

Joe McCarthy (01:02:41):

Yeah. I don't want to find out. Not at all.

Billy Ayer (01:02:46):

Joe, you should pull out your mountain lion skull that you-

Joe McCarthy (01:02:50):

Yeah, I'll go get it. It's just right back here.

Billy Ayer (01:02:54):

Mountain lion attacked Joe while he was bow hunting and he shot it at two, three yards in face.

Joe McCarthy (01:03:03):

These are the teeth that wanted to eat me and it did. So this cat came in at the same time my brother was a bugling a bull, and I was looking at the elk, not knowing the cat was there. I got my arrow knocked. I'm sitting there. It's about 25 yards to the bull. Can't really shoot him because he is a bunch of brush. And I'm thinking, why is that elk looking over there and not looking... What's going on? And then the elk blows out and runs past my left shoulder at about well 15, 20 yards. The cat goes by my right shoulder to where it actually hits my shoulder. The tail hits my shoulder as it runs past me because we're on a hillside and I'm in a creek bank. The cat goes about 20 yards past me, and figures out, hey, there was something else back there. It turns and looks at me and I look at it. I'm thinking, oh cougar, cool.

Joe McCarthy (01:03:56):

And then it literally takes three bounds coming right at me. I was knocked. I had my arrow already. I shot him at about less than five yards. Hit him in the collarbone and it came out his pelvis. But this is him. The issue with this cat was that he was getting old and I think he'd tried to eat a porcupine, which didn't sit well with his face because he had porcupine quills all over it and he had porcupine quills in his lips and everything else. And I think he just was getting old and thought I would be a lot better product than an elk.

Tommy Sessions (01:04:36):

Well, you got some pretty wild stories, being pissed on by elk and attacked by-

Joe McCarthy (01:04:42):

That's a true story.

Tommy Sessions (01:04:46):

[inaudible 01:04:46].

Billy Ayer (01:04:46):

Pepper spraying himself.

Tommy Sessions (01:04:47):

Yeah. So you got everything off the mountain, got it to your butcher or your processor, however you're doing it. It's successful season hopefully. Everything's gone good. Even after your rifle hunts or whatever you do, because a lot of times our hunting season's three months long or whatever. But what do you do with your equipment?

Joe McCarthy (01:05:11):

Well, again, with my bow and stuff, I try to keep active with that and keep shooting through the year. And I think that keeps things going. Obviously looking through things though, because four wheeler rides and things like that do take a beating on things. And this is the time now that if you're looking at strings, this is the time to change them for a bow. Because now if you change your strings now, then by next fall you'll have them all shot in and then they're not going to stretch as much. And it's going to take a builder time to build strings. So shoot them, do what you need to, but change your strings out. Make sure any of the cables on rests and things like that that take a beating, if there's any issues that, change all that stuff out. This is the time to do. If you want to change a rest out, change a site out, this is the time to do it.

Joe McCarthy (01:06:06):

Far as boots go, covering them with some a boot grease or do whatever you need to do to clean them up, because you don't want to put your boots away muddy, because again, boots take a beating. Clean that stuff up. And then again, going through stuff like your knives, this is the time you sharpen your knives. This is the time to look at broadheads. broadheads, I'm not a real mechanical guy. I actually shoot a broadhead called Tooth of the Arrow. I'm really happy with the way that they've worked. They are a carbon steel blade, so they will rust a little bit. So I will actually put a little oil on the blades to keep them from rusting.

Joe McCarthy (01:06:47):

Typically, even though I have them in oil and they're still pretty sharp, I will still probably buy a new pack next year and I'll use those other ones as my practice arrows, grouse arrows, whatever. They obviously the same heads, so they fly exactly the same. But I will keep at least three heads that are brand new in my quiver all the time. And I rotate those old ones out, but covering those blades up in a little bit of oil so they don't rust is a good thing.

Joe McCarthy (01:07:21):

Again, going through and cleaning up your stuff because... Batteries, leaving batteries in electronics, things can go bad. You end up opening your stuff up next year and you find big acid thing in the thing. So pulling batteries out's really a good idea.

Billy Ayer (01:07:38):

Made that mistake.

Joe McCarthy (01:07:40):

Yeah. and this is also that bag thing. I take things out. I soak my bags. I try to reuse them. But this is the point too, where you look at your bags, it's going, is this bag going to make it another year or not? If not, I might repurpose it to something else, but that may be the time to go buy again, new bags or stuff. But I try to do all that repurchasing of stuff that time of year, that October, November, December. It's also a great time and when the shows come out, the Salt Lake Expo where we met. Going down there and this is a great time to buy that stuff, go buy all that stuff, see all the new cool stuff.

Tommy Sessions (01:08:25):

So I'm superstitious and this is probably not a great gear topic for me. But if I shoot a bull at your, I'm not washing my pack and I know yeah, my hunting partner was like, "Dude, you smell so bad." I'm like, "I don't care." I don't wear Dead Down Wind. I don't wear any scent off stuff. Because if you're getting smelled by a bull, it doesn't matter if you're wearing that or not. I'm superstitious. I played baseball. I don't wash my pack.

Joe McCarthy (01:08:56):

You're not washing your underwear either, are you?

Tommy Sessions (01:08:58):

Oh no, I do that. I do that. So again, but that's blood, the bacteria of the blood. Don't tell Steve or anybody that I abuse their pack like that. It's a testament to some of the gear out there that it can. I've had my pack for about five years now. And I've packed out a lot of animals and it's been wash only a couple times. What is the proper care? Not my care, because again, mine's used and abused and superstitious, but what is the proper care of a dirty pack with not necessarily mud, but blood or?

Joe McCarthy (01:09:35):

Wash a lot of stuff out with vinegar. We'll soak our packs in water. I have a big tub that we literally just one of those big tubs you buy at Costco. Fill that thing with water, throw all that stuff in there, obviously pull everything out, put it in there. But soaking stuff with vinegar is one of the things. My wife's actually the one that's really good at directing me or helping me or actually even doing it.

Tommy Sessions (01:10:03):

She keeps you in line.

Joe McCarthy (01:10:05):

Yeah. Trying to get all that stuff out. The packs I'm using with Blacks Creek, Sandy Caster here in Nampa, they can absorb some... There's a fabric there that can absorb blood and it can get crusty and it can get hard. And so soaking all that out, getting that stuff out, I think keeps the fabric pliable and keeps the zippers good and all that stuff. I think that stuff is important, keeping all that stuff clean and so it operates well. I will say this, too. When I broke pieces, usually to my screwing up, I've taken stuff back and Sandy's fixed a strap or two or whatever to help me get my pack back in shape. But I think soaking them. Soak it. You get blood in the water, empty that water out, put it, fill it back up, do it again, do it again, do it again.

Joe McCarthy (01:11:04):

And that I think even baking soda, I'll actually rub baking soda, make a paste when it's wet and rub that in there. Try to get some odors. You're talking about the blood and I agree. There's times, that elk that came in with us on the elk, I think the elk are smelling the other elk and they come into that.

Joe McCarthy (01:11:25):

So smelling like an elk's not a bad thing, but you also in a pack are going to have... I sweat. I wear that pack every day I'm hunting and I sweat a lot into that pack. And so I'm trying to get all that out there as well. And then I'll spray it. I will spray it with that enzyme, same stuff we used in our vet, when I wore my bulletproof vest, that thing gets ripe during the summer. I spray it that Dead Down Wind, the enzyme stuff, and it makes it so I can wear it the next day. I'll spray that pack down with that, when it's all over after and let it dry on there.

Joe McCarthy (01:12:03):

I do the same thing with all my clothes really. And our clothes, when it comes to hunting season and even if you went into our laundry room right now, there's a whole bunch of soaps that we only use during hunting season or when we we're cleaning our clothes. We don't wash our clothing, anything that we wear hunting, we don't wash that in Tide or Purell or whatever. We wash it in the actual stuff for hunting. So it doesn't have scents. It goes out of the way. Maybe the other stuff doesn't, but I know this stuff is packaged to not have scent and not do any UV dyes that make things colorful or whatever. I will only wash that clothing in that stuff. We're religious on that thing. Because I think scent is way more important than camo.

Joe McCarthy (01:12:59):

I think you can wear... Cody killed that nice big bull last year wearing a black Montana Knife Company shirt and his Fish and Game green pants. He doesn't work for Fish and Game, but they're the green, I don't know who, the King's camo pants. Just the nice dress pants. He was not camoed up in any way, but he's in a position where they don't smell him and he stands still. I've killed a lot of elk in t-shirts and shorts and scent is the most important thing. And trying to eliminate that as far as you can and staying down wind always, even when you have everything done with scent, you still stand down wind.

Tommy Sessions (01:13:40):

Yep. Absolutely. Well, Bill, you got anything else for Joe?

Joe McCarthy (01:13:45):

No, I think that was great. I think somebody who listens to this could definitely get a few pointers from e-scouting to preparing for the season to the actual hunt and preparing your meat and getting it-

Tommy Sessions (01:13:58):

[inaudible 01:13:58]. All right. Well, thanks Joe. We appreciate it. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and all your years of experience.

Joe McCarthy (01:14:05):

Yep. Nope. I appreciate the opportunity to sit down and visit with you guys. It's fun.

Tommy Sessions (01:14:11):

Absolutely. Thanks Joe.