Aside from making sure that deer have adequate nutrition, it’s also important that we take care of the land they graze on. This is the advocacy of Complete Deer Management’s Kasey Thren. In this episode, we delve into why every aspect of the hunt is important. Kasey shares how joining the Quality Deer Management Association opened his eyes to understand more about the beasts that he hunts. He insists that deer are smarter than we give them credit for and that we owe them a decent end.
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LISTEN TO THE PODCAST HERE:
Landscaping for trophy whitetails – Kasey Thren
We’re heading out to Michigan to visit with the owner of Complete Deer Management, Kasey Thren. Kasey, welcome.
Thanks, Bruce. I’m glad to be here.
Let’s start right off and tell people what Complete Deer Management is all about.
Complete Deer Management is a business about managing hunting properties for deer. I called it complete because I want to try to hit every aspect that the client could possibly need a manager property for deer. This is from everything, putting up lines to putting in food plots. I try to instill timber stand improvements and everything that they need, even consulting, coming out and giving an extra couple pair of eyes on it and giving them suggestions. That’s the premise, everything there is to deal with the hunting property, the goals and objectives that the client needs.
How small of a parcel will you go down to?
Any size, I haven’t seen too many one-acre or two-acre deals. However, I have talked to a few guys that hunt on one acre or less. I used to own and hunt on five acres where my old business was located. I shot does off it, I can get them in there and shoot does. Bucks were a little different story, especially here where I am in Central Michigan, mid-Michigan area. There are a number of parcels that are here in the deer world smaller, you would say.
When you look at one acre, I know guys that’s what they hunt in suburbia. They do well because the whole thing is a funnel. The whole thing is a transition zone and a staging zone. It’s everything in one place. You’ve got an interstate on one side and a house on the other. There’s a lot of deer there, no question. You have to figure out a little different format, that’s for sure. It’s hard putting up food plots next to the fence on end on the interstate. It’s possible in Michigan. Let’s talk about your beginning and how you’re an “expert” in landscaping for whitetails.
I’ve been hunting since I’ve been twelve or thirteen years old. I’ve always been a hunter. My mentor wasn’t my dad but it was an ex-brother-in-law of mine who got me into it. If it wasn’t for him, I don’t know if I ever would have done it. I was always interested. When I was young and BB gun age, I remember my grandma used to tell me about hunting and the course beckon that. Some days they hunted for food a lot. When I shot my first rabbit, she showed me how to clean it. She cooked it up for me and we ate it. When I got my bone shot my first deer, I was twelve or thirteen and that was it for me. I’ve been hunting for several years, but I never got into the managing side much.
Here in Michigan, the heavy tradition of going out getting a buck and deer camp is big. It’s coming around more managing as you get more people and fewer places to hunt. When I started this, I’ve always put in food plots. My background is in horticulture so I have a horticulture degree. If I went from putting in residential and commercial landscapes not for deer, putting in plants that deer don’t eat or less preferred to getting plants and the deer duty. Once I joined the Quality Deer Management Association, QDMA, I’m like, “Why wasn’t I in this from the beginning it?” Something hit me over the head and go, “What was I doing?” I kicked myself in the rear for not being involved sooner, understanding more about deer and deer biology. This is like, “I’ve got to figure out a way to do this.”
Luckily, I’ve been able to do this full-time. It transitioned from the old business, putting in food plots. Back in 2008 or 2007 in Michigan, they had a CWD in an enclosure. They banned baiting for a few years. Everybody was in the food plots. I started getting into it a lot more at that time I wasn’t charging people. Seeing that there was a niche there to make a little bit of money, it gets me in the door. It’s coming around to consulting. The bigger names that are doing it are still out there and doing well. I’m going in the back door and working my way up. I’m still learning myself but I’ve got a good base with the QDMA and my horticulture background and wildlife forestry conservation. There’s a lot to it and there’s always a lot to learn.
I understand from your bio that you’re a Deer Steward with QDMA. What’s that all about?
The QDMA has so much information to learn biology and about deer. They offer Deer Steward class. They have an acronym REACH: Research, Educate, Advocate, Certify and Hunt. They have certifications that you can learn right from the QDMA. The CEO, Brian Murphy, Kip Adams, Matt Ross, and Joe Hamilton, the founder, are always there. They bring in professors that they work with from different universities. You sit right down with them and learn from them through PowerPoint presentations.
There are three levels of being a Deer Steward. It’s all about pretty much classroom work that you can do online. I went to Missouri and spent the weekend. It’s a deer school overload and your brain was working the whole time. A lot of a-ha moments and stuff like that when you learn all the biology and why deer do what they do. The Deer Steward is more hands-on. Luckily, it was in Michigan that year because I think they only have two or three a year.
You get to go down and walk around the woods. You learn about native habitat, what deer eat, how deer act, travel and breed and different techniques of soil and food plots. They teach you how to read maps and follow the deer trails and try to become a better hunter of them. There’s a Deer Steward 3 where you work on your own. They leave it to you. There’s an application process where you do all these different things for the requirements. You can become a Deer Steward 3, which is their highest level. That’s good if you’re a deer hunter. I recommend it to every deer hunter out there.
If you have too many deer and don't have enough food, you’ve got a problem. Share on XIf you haven’t taken any time, get the QDMA deer report. If you do nothing else, get that. They’ll show you the depth of what QDMA does and the research. I’m a proponent of QDMA. There are some great people out there and Kasey mentioned them. I’m taking the class 1 and I’ve only been hunting whitetails from 51. I’m talking with Kip and some of the other people there. It will give me insights when I’m talking to my guest on the show. I’ll be able to ask them questions that I can’t ask. Especially in whitetail hunting, you’ll never know everything. You know that John Stan has produced a buck for 21 years. Why? Ask yourself that question and I would challenge anybody to ask themselves that question. Why has John Stan produced a buck every year for years? There’s a reason for that. If you go back and check everything and backtrack the deer and find out his movements, you’re going to be astounded to what that deer will tell you. We don’t do that. I don’t do that enough.
I’m ready about QDMA but it’s probably going to be the best investment that they do have. Openings and the online course, they opened it up. Matt Ross is in charge of that. Get hold of them and say, “I’d like to be part of that.” You’re going to do the online course at home. Football season is over, shed season started but there still might be some snow. A couple of months, you can knock that sucker out. That’s my shout out promo for Quality Deer Management and their Deer Steward program. Let’s go back to Kasey. I call you up. I’ve got a 40-acre plot. It’s a little farmland, little woodland, little swamp and I’ve got a couple of roads around it. My neighbors are brown and down. I want to suck deer onto my property so I’ll get a chance to get a mature buck. What do I do?
Usually, what I do is talk to the potential client on the phone. It averages about an hour that we’re on the phone. I have a list of a number of questions to ask them. If they’re calling me already, they’re already thinking about improving their land. I have an idea that they want to do something to help themselves be better and successful at deer hunting. There could be all levels. They could be, “I want to shoot quality bucks all the time or I want to shoot trophy bucks all the time.” I can’t guarantee or I don’t know who can but I can get you to shoot on a 130-inch class in a few years. I can’t say for sure that you’re even going to see them or have them.
However, what I can do is have a list of questions that I ask them. The average home range of a deer is 40 acres. That’s knowledge through the QDMA’s research that they’ve done. Some deer are lower, some deer are higher acreage. We know that a lot of deer are coming through your property and we cannot control all of them. If there’s a bunch of shooting on there, the first thing I would ask them to do is reach out to your neighbors. Reach out to your neighbors and have a conversation with them and see what they’re doing. That conversation has to be in the beginning, has to be light and get to know them a little bit. The more they know you, the better it is that maybe you can work together.
I’m sure you’ve heard of the deer cooperatives and neighbors working together. You can start talking about that and seeing how they do it. One good thing is to teach them the benefits. Let’s say you do want to shoot some quality deer. For a lot of my clients and me, it’s two-and-a-half years old or older bucks. In my area where I hunt, I have twenty acres. I’m in line with that example you gave me. I talk to my neighbors and see what they’re doing. If they shoot a lot of yearling bucks, there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t get upset with it.
I’ve been upset with it before. They’re not worth the time and effort to do that. I can’t control it, let that go. Try to help them out. Maybe give them a QDMA membership or a pamphlet that says the benefits of letting the yearlings go and the benefits of having the correct amount of deer on the land. That’s the start, obviously, we both know that there’s a whole lot more to it. There’s a property visit involved. We see what the deer are doing on the land, see what the land has. You need a diverse habitat. If the land has something, we try to either improve on it and then give the land something that it doesn’t have.
Around here in Michigan, a lot of the native vegetation isn’t around because a lot of it gets deer-browsed heavily. We have a lot of deer numbers, we try to timber stand improvement. Usually, first we look at the native habitat, get rid of the less desired species like ferns and birds. I was going to give you plants that they do eat. That’s pretty much a good one, but there are lots of things. Usually grasses, it’s a low preferred food, we got to get rid of those things from what deer do eat. You’ll see deer usually and then we got to get those deer in a hunting position so we can travel them around your property. Get them on your property during daylight so you can see them and shoot them. It’s one of those things where the landowner has to commit. You do a bunch of work at first, then there’s always something to do on the property as long as you own it.
What about hinge cutting? A lot of people I saw in Land & Legacy, Matt and I put some up on hinge cutting, what it is and what it isn’t. A lot of people use it to create bedding, other people use it to create trails so the deer won’t go X, I’ll go Y. What’s your thought on hinge cutting even on 40 acres?
It’s a valuable tool. It’s one of those things where when you go into a mechanic shop or a doctor’s office, they have a big old toolbox. Almost every tool you can imagine is in there to rebuild a car. Same thing here, we need as many different tools in our toolbox and hinge cutting is definitely one of them. I’m hinge cutting on my property, there’s a lot of felling too so I fell some trees down. Create some daylight which will create the new early growth to come in and bush it up and it’s all food too.
Here in Michigan, it’s popular and it doesn’t look pretty. If you’re in a hug club or maybe even you and your spouse. You go out there and create a mess. You’ve got to look at it through the deer’s eyes. Deer see that and go, “That’s beautiful.” We sometimes look at and go, “That’s ugly. It’s a mess, I don’t like walking through it.” However, it’s good to do that stuff for blocking and access and food and bedding. It’s one of those tools you can do too much of it and then it’s dangerous, you got to be careful doing it.
As soon as you knock a tree down, especially like here in the winter. I’m building a little two-foot trail for me to walk alongside my property lines to get to the back of my property, being twenty acres. To get those older bucks in here two, three-year-old you got to make them think that you’re not hunting them. It’s pretty difficult. That was in two hours. I had deer in there eating what I cut down which was poplar, maple, some black cherry, stuff like that.
It’s nice to talk to somebody if you do get into hinge cutting that’s done it before. To give you some tips, if it’s a maple, sometimes they’re dangerous and they’ll barber chair and they’ll call and come back on you. You’ve got to be careful of the size of the tree that you hinge cut. Poplar or aspen, they don’t hinge cut, you might as well cut them off and down. There are lots of videos out there, lots of good guys out there on YouTube that have done it. I use it as a tool.
There are a lot of tools but you have to use them in a series of rotation. It’s like building a house, you start with a foundation. Building a herd is our foundation and then we’ll start putting up the sidewalls and the floor and all that stuff.
It’s a good foundation. Sometimes if you do something, and a lot of guys don’t know where to start too, sometimes in that way, I’ll bounce ideas off other guys and stuff like that. The QDMA has four building blocks of overall deer land management. Hunter management, herd management, bird monitoring, and habitat management are your four building blocks. Each one has its own components but on your land, you need a good foundation. I haven’t run into the circumstance yet where I’ve messed up my foundation. You may have done a lot of work and usually, for me, I put in a lot of food plots, usually 50, 60 acres a year. A lot of different people and that’s the first thing they want to do. That’s probably shouldn’t be the first thing you go to when you’re talking about your management. 70% of a deer’s diet is native vegetation, and we’ve got to make sure that the native vegetation is there so our food plots are successful.
If there are high deer numbers, especially here, we’re at Michigan they destroy food plots. Food plots are one of the most expensive things you can do to your land, one of the highest quality foods you can probably give the deer. You can go spend $500 to $600 on a little plot and the deer destroy it and you’re not happy that’s happening. It’s pretty complex and hopefully I can help clients utilize their money in a good way. They’re not blowing some and wasting it and get them a good building block in the foundation.
We take an overall picture of it. What are some of the glaring omissions on anybody’s land?
Food plots are one of the most expensive things you can do to your land, one of the highest quality foods you can probably give the deer. Share on XUsually, its native habitat where I’m at here in Michigan. Michigan has high numbers of deer in pockets in areas, they use a lot of the land. They are eating machines, four to six pounds of food on an average-sized deer, you take 100, 120-pound deer eating that much dry matter a day, that’s a lot. You have does and you have bucks. If you have older bucks, they’re going to eat a lot more. It’s native food. I didn’t know this before I joined the Quality Deer Management Association. I’m thinking back, I don’t want to talk bad about anybody. It’s a lack of knowledge that you don’t understand what a deer eats and how they eat it and how they go about eating it. That’s one of the things. I remember in some of the PowerPoint presentations that you get in the Deer Steward. You’ll see a deer in the middle of a field, could be a hay grass field, are they out there eating grass? Probably not.
If you walk out there and I still do it in my backyard here, I’ll see a deer eating something. I’ll walk over there and see what it is and I’ll write that down, “On January or February 4th, I saw a deer eating a woody browse.” I know that’s their preferred food. I’m getting into a little bit more research and if I can find the resources to take a snap of that woody browse, put in a baggie. Send it to the lab and see what’s in it, see why they’re eating that. What’s in it? Are they getting enough nutrition out of it?
Quality Deer Management and the QDMA, they’re two different things. They both say quality deer management, but one is association and one is the philosophy. Both philosophies, how the QDMA is, deer health, healthy deer and healthy deer herd. That means what they’re eating. That means the number of deer that land can support. If you have too many deer and you don’t have enough food, you got a problem. You have undernutrition deer and you have them getting by and almost in a constant state of starvation. What do you do about it? You’ve got to shoot some deer or you’ve got to improve your habitat. I would rather improve my habitat if I can. On twenty acres, I can’t control my herd. I have to rely on my neighbors and to work with them and getting your numbers I can have an idea but I can’t control it.
We’ve been talking about deer management and making them grow. Let’s talk about hunting. That’s why we do all this work, there are a few people who do it because they love to have deer on their farm and they don’t hunt. That’s good because they’re hunting from the neighborhood. The neighboring farms have an opportunity for mature bucks, that’s huge. Some people like that greater sanctuary so bucks can grow, nothing wrong with that. Let’s talk about Kasey and your hunting style. On your twenty acres, how do you hunt?
I love hunting, if I had the time and I was available to hunt every day I would, anytime that I could be in a tree stand that’s my favorite, archery. Being close to deer is exciting. Seeing deer walk by you or watching them do what they do on the woods during pre-rut with the chasing and all that stuff. All that is exciting to see. I have to be careful about this smaller hunting, my scent control should be extreme. I’m not good at my scent control, I’m still in the process of learning. I know the process and some of the things I need to be doing, but I’m still learning, I’m still getting better.
I spend so much time on the habitat and not on my property on everybody else’s property. That I don’t spend enough time for myself on the hunting side of it. I’m committing myself to do that a little bit better. My scent control has to be pretty extreme. I got to try to get out there on the right days when I think the deer are moving and are back here. That means high-pressure systems before rain or before a snowstorm or before a cold front when more deer are active.
I got a low area, the wind swirls in my back around a swamp that I have. I don’t look at it a whole lot, but I do look at it. I’m like, “Is this tough? I want to hunt, I want to be out there.” I might look into other avenues, maybe hunt on some state ground. It’s keeping the pressure off my property. I did learn that in about a 300-acre section here that I have, there’s one other bow hunter and me and he’s 50 yards from me because he’s a neighbor. We’re the only bowhunters.
If I put any pressure, heavy pressure on it at all, the deer have all that other property that they can use and feel safe. Not to say I don’t get deer here, I do get deer here and I do get some quality bucks here. I have to pick the right day to hunt them or be able to shoot them, it is tough. I do gun hunt. I like gun hunting. I grew up gun hunting it’s a big tradition here in Michigan. On my twenty acres, we live on it with my family. I’ve not fallen out of love with it, I still do it. I can almost hunt my ground with a crossbow or archery during gun season and I’d be happy.
If you think about twenty acres, how many stands do you have?
I have four stands up and I need more. I’m going to do some situating, I’m in the process of changing a lot to the property. I have hinge cut along my access line and I don’t want deer there but deer are magnet right now. I’m going to do some more hinge cutting on the interior for some bedding. Hopefully, I can take up their time on my property takes them a lot longer to get through my property. I’ve got one main trail, you can see on social media on my Facebook page. I’ll post some videos from trail cameras or some pictures. I need to get those deer routed to stay on my property a little bit longer.
Not to say I’m cutting the deer off from my neighbor, but I’m trying to cut them off from a neighbor a little bit. Make it more difficult to get to his bait pile or whatever he’s doing over there, it’s a challenge. I got four or five and I need some more. One acre is all I have of open ground where I put some food in and it’s an overhead power line. It’s in front of the house too. It’s on the front of the house north side of the property. I avoid that area, I don’t hunt it at all. My wife does hunt but it’s hard for her to get out. We’re trying to do what we can and hopefully one of these days we’ll get it figured out.
It’s amazing how we can look at a piece of property, be hanging in a piece of property and then go, “I didn’t think about that.” Your neighbor with a bait pile or things like that, definitely an attractant. How do you work around that? What’s one thing you learned from the last hunting season that you want to share with our readers?
It happens almost to me every year but on those days, especially if you work a lot or work full-time and has some vacation time. A lot of guys, a lot of the managers or the good hunters they’re more expert than I am hunting the deer. They look at the weather and they’ll look at a lot of different things. I didn’t notice especially on a smaller property the hunt the right day. Not necessarily right wind if your scent control is good, you should be able to hunt any wind. When there’s a high pressure and low temps and those lines come together, get out there. Another thing I probably should have done some more is when the bucks are chasing the deer or they’re trying to find their mate, you should be out as much as you can be. One other thing is, I don’t wash my clothes every time I get done. I learned I might change my base layer. I use an X-series base layer wash every time, not your outer clothing, those ones that touch your skin, I’m going to do that.
Do you take a shower before you go out every time?
No, I don’t. One thing I see a lot of guys doing is building a scent room. They have a separate little room that the washer and dryer are dedicated to only hunting clothes. The towel that they use is only for hunting, scent-free soap. I’m not in a position to take a shower every day. I’d wake my wife up and she probably let me. I don’t want to do that necessarily. I love deer hunting. I want to shoot a nice deer but it’s more important to me to keep her happy than me shooting the deer. I don’t want to wake her up every morning and stuff like that. Once I get my scent out of my pole bar or whatever I may do that, but not every time. When I do go on an afternoon hunt, I can take a shower right before. Going back to extreme scent control, I’m not there yet.
What type of boots do you wear?
If your scent control is good, you should be able to hunt any wind. Share on XI’ve got some muck boots and I dedicate those to hunting. They’re the high boots, rubber. I’ll spray those down with some scent killer spray. I don’t use a lot of scent killer spray. They work fine but they are dedicated to hunting. When I do come in, I put them in a tote. Keep them dry, keep the insides dry. They work pretty well. When it gets cold, I use some of those heated thermos cells I got for Christmas. Those are nice.
The thing that I know about scent control is that no matter what you do, if you don’t approach your stand right, it’s not going to make a difference. Please don’t send me hate mail for saying that. Sometimes we get all the gear in the world, but we’re not applying it right. That’s the correct way to say it and I think anybody would agree to that. If you don’t do that, then what’s the point?
We can hate. I’ve tried different things like scent bombs. If someone says, “This works.” I don’t want to down anybody’s products. Ozonics, I think they put in a tree or in their blind. I don’t know much about it, but a lot of the guys that have it seem to love it and stand by it. What I think is deer accept human scent. I have a little bit of an advantage. I can’t go out and pet my deer but my neighbor, two houses over, she feeds deer off her bird feeder. She can go out there, I see her feeding the deer or maybe she’s doing her bird feeder, but they’re right behind her ten yards. She’s got her little dogs out there.
Those deer know my pattern more than I think they do. They know when our house door opens and shuts. They know when we drive in and out. I’ve been in the back of my property hunting and I can tell when somebody drives in the driveway. Deer are a lot better at the hearing and seeing than I am. It’s tough. On the scent control, they’ll accept some of my scents but I don’t know how much. I can have a deer walk downwind of me. I don’t necessarily know if the scent is going over them or not.
Ten minutes later have another deer do the exact same thing and looking right up or notice something. Not necessarily get busted, but they know something. They smell me or they’re sensing me. I’m usually high enough, I didn’t notice I’m at least twenty feet in the air, you can fool their vision, especially if you have some structure either in front of you or around you behind you. You can usually fool their vision as long as there’s no quick movements or anything like that. The scent thing is a tough deal.
You see some things with different sprays and everything. You go, “What is that doing for the deer?”
I’m not a scientist and I don’t know what’s usually in it. I have an idea, you can make your own they say. You got dirt scent or apple scent or you can jam it on deer’s nose. I’ve used deer jammer before. I got success and then other times I haven’t. It went back and forth. It might not even be the nose jammer. It could have been totally something different. I have no idea. I have gotten away from those different things a little bit, finding my own.
I am a believer in the carbon stuff. I use a carbon mask over my breath. I have noticed from the years that I haven’t used it in the years that I do or when I do, that’s a big difference. There’s a lot of scent coming out of your breath. If I can hold it down a little bit or control it, I have noticed a big difference in that. Your armpits, your feet, your head are probably the biggest things you need to cover up. I wish there was a thing you could walk by like an X-ray machine or something on your way out and see how contaminated you are.
If you want to chime in, I’d certainly welcome any conversations and so with Kasey. Reach out to [email protected]. If you know about this scent knocked out, I’d love to hear from you, reach out to me on social media because it’s an interesting business. Ozonics is a great company. You get the scent crusher people from Scent Crusher and all the carbon gear. It’s a huge business and they’re doing something right. It’s always interesting to have conversations and see how we can make it better. What are three or four things that you do every single year when it’s time to go archery hunting?
I shoot my bow as much as I can. I probably should shoot it more. I’ve had the same equipment though, the same bow for several years. I usually have the same arrow rest, the same sight, arrows, broadheads everything. I’ve used it for a long time. I don’t like changing that stuff up much because I like what I know. Number one, I would say shooting your bow as much as possible. We owe it to the animals that we hunt to do our best to take a good clean ethical shot. To down them or kill them as quickly as possible. The last thing we want is big long tracks and I know they happen. It happens to every hunter. It is disappointing when that happens, but it does happen. Number two, trail cameras, I utilize those a lot. I have them out year-round. It’s a good way to try to get to know your deer herd better, whether you’re using it to count the deer numbers. They can be addicting, it’s fun doing them but you can overdo it. I overdo it usually. Those are two things: buy your licenses and stay legal. Make sure your gear is in good working order, most important.
Kasey, on behalf of thousands of readers across North America, thanks for sitting down with us and talking about Complete Deer Management.
Thank you, Bruce. I appreciate the opportunity. I haven’t done this much. Hopefully, I get into this stuff a little bit more and I’d love to sit down with you. We touched on some subjects and we could talk for days on this stuff. This is my life, my passion. I’m going to keep learning and passing on the information hopefully. I appreciate it, Bruce.
Important Links:
- Complete Deer Management
- Quality Deer Management Association
- Facebook – Kasey Thren
- Ozonics
- [email protected]
- Scent Crusher
About Kasey Thren
Why QDM? I fell into this profession because it was a calling to me. I love hunting deer and it has always been a staple in my life. This is a way to be around my serenity year-round. The education I’ve gathered and continue to accumulate is endless and I’m up for the challenge. My goal is to meet your goals and expectations. What I have learned and worked hard for through blood sweat and tears is to know I will give you everything I have to make your hunting experience fun and memorable. FUN is the number one objective.
I have been installing food plots professionally since 2007. Before that I installed them for myself and other hunting friends. My professional background is Ornamental Horticulture (Ferris State University) – Landscape design and installation. More recently I’ve been educated by the Quality Deer Management Association, Deer Steward Program (2011), Land Certification Program to write management plans and perform a variety of skills for hunting properties.
I completed certification in Wildlife/Forestry Conservation from Penn Foster (2011). I have on going wildlands fire training, forester training and more. I write articles for my own blog and Michigan Hooks and Bullets Magazine. I also host, write, produce, video, photograph and edit a variety of land management tasks as well as hunting videos for my online series Complete Deer TV “Landscaping for Whitetails”
The companies and products that advertise with me and promote are used and tested under extreme conditions with on going research and development. What’s even better is building relationships with those companies and understanding that the folks that produce these products are even better people. It’s a true honor to be working for better habitat, better hunting and a better life. I’m current President of Costabella QDMA Branch, Committee member for Mid-Michigan QDMA Branch and former Committee member for the State of Michigan Wildlife Society Branch. I live in Clare Michigan where I’m a stay at home father with my wife Michelle, 3 children – Holden and twins Grace and Macey.