Showing much commitment to deer hunting, Austin Bittner is a 365-day a year hunter. He shares from his experiences some tips as well as some techniques on how you can hunt yourself. Starting with his own personal story, Austin talks about when he became a hunter – tracing it down to his first hunting with his father to when he started shooting rifles at around six years old. He then shares his 2018 season and some highlights and memorable encounters during deer hunting. Learn some great information about the type of sequence Austin uses when blatting, how he hunts at home, combatting skylighting, scent checking bucks, and the future of hunting.
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Deer Hunting 365 with Austin Bittner
We’re heading out to Columbus, Wisconsin area and we’re going to connect with Austin Bittner. He is one of these young guns. He’s twenty-some years old, college student but he’s a 365-day a year hunter. He’s going to share some tips and techniques and tell you why hunting’s the best thing in his life. Austin, welcome to the show.
Bruce, I appreciate you having me and I definitely look forward to our conversation we’re going to have.
If you don’t know where Austin goes to school, tell them where you go to school.
I’m a fourth-year Mechanical Engineering student at Michigan Tech. That’s up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in Houghton. It’s about six hours from home.
There’s a post there and it’s a high post. How much was the record snowfall in the Upper Peninsula?
It’s over 300 inches. We definitely get enough snow up there.
That’s the type of snow he gets where he goes to school. We connected on Instagram and thanks for reaching out to me because I always love to sit and chat and talk about hunting. Let’s start right off with your 2018 season, when it began and when it ended.
I had an excellent year. I shot a buck with both my gun and my bow. It started back in the summer months when you’re putting your food plots in, when you’re running your trail cameras. I do a lot of work on that as anybody else would, but I will never miss opening day of bow season. In 2019, I will because I’ll be in Colorado elk hunting. Our season opens September 15th in Wisconsin. I’m always there for the opener. In 2018, it was a pretty tough opener. We had some pretty warm weather and the mosquitoes were awful. I had to be in bug nets or have a Thermacell on me at all times. I fought through it. It was a slower, early season. We saw a bunch of does and smaller bucks but nothing of interest. I’d say around October 15th or so we had a cold front come through. I started to see a lot of the three-and-a-halves starting to get on their feet. I trust my cameras a lot. I run fifteen or sixteen cameras between my two properties that I can hunt and check them.
I started to see around the 15th that the nicer bucks we’re moving. A couple of my shooters were starting to move. Back in the summer, I had probably the biggest buck I’ve ever had on camera running around but he disappeared in September. I started to switch my focus to a pair of four-and-a-half-year-old ten-pointers that we had around. We had an eight-pointer too. It was October 21st or so I saw the one big ten for the first time. He was locked down with a doe. It was awful early, but it must’ve been one of the first available ones. He came out of a little block of woods. There are two blocks of woods on mine. There’s a small block and then there’s a bigger block. He was about the third nice buck I’d seen come out of that block of woods and not come up to the hill to me. I put that in the back of my head. I probably should start looking into where they’re going after that because they’re not doing what they have in the past. That day I walked out of the stand after a couple of hours of not seeing them. They were laying on the edge of that block of woods. I bumped both him and the doe. That one broke my heart watching them run away. After that, I backed off on hunting him because I knew I bumped him once. I’ve got to give him some time to take the pressure off.
I had a four-year-old eight-pointer on mine. I figured he would be a good buck to shoot. I let a friend of mine come over, Colton. The first day out was October 24th. I started seeing the bucks with the does or pushing the does. I’m a big fan of using the bleat call in that early October 20th range when they’re first starting to look. I gave a couple of bleat calls and he came right in 30 yards and my friend shot him. He went 50 yards and it was the biggest buck he’d ever shot and he was pretty happy about it. That was definitely one of the cooler things that I’ve gotten to see is I got to watch my best friend shoot his biggest buck.
I’d seen that big one out of trying to get back to him. Saturday night I saw him again come out of the same spot. I’m usually one not to be aggressive with things. There’s a patch of weather coming the next day, windy and rain. I said, “When that comes in, I need to get into that corner of that woods and I need to hang a stand. I did. I saw him again Sunday night come out of the same spot. I didn’t want to hunt the stand that night that I hung it. I waited until Monday morning. I pulled a few strings to get out of class on Monday morning. It was one of the coolest hunts I’ve ever had. About half an hour after daylight, the one eight-pointer came running down the edge of the woods with his tail tucked. I’ve seen that many times when there’s a big buck around. He was a nice eight-point smaller buck by any means and I knew there had to be something back there.
After about five minutes, I heard some crashing and an adult came running behind me with this ten-pointer behind her. I got to watch him breed her. After that, he stayed with the doe when I had him at 50 but there was a branch and it was October 29th. I didn’t feel comfortable shooting them at 50 yards. I don’t like to shoot over 40. He went with the doe and that eight-pointer came back into the woods when I grunted and start wheezing. That big one came back and chased them around. He put on a heck of a show. He was grunting, started wheezing, scoring them up to fight. I got them eventually to 40 yards. I smoked him and he went 30 yards and he fell over. That was one of the coolest encounters that I’ve had bow hunting as far as the interaction with the deer, getting to watch them breed the doe, grunt and snort wheeze.
Were you snort wheezing them back? Were you talking to them?
When he started to walk away with the doe, I hit the grunt call. You could tell he was agitated but he wasn’t going to leave that doe. We took a few more steps and I snort wheezed at him. He snort wheezed back and at the same time that eight-pointer came running into the woods and then I let that two interact. I was quiet so it was more real.
What was the snort?
It was the normal snort wheeze.
Hunting is my happy place. I am more alive in the woodlots than anywhere else. I hunt 365 days a year by learning about whitetails, their habits, their patterns and how they communicate. I love hunting whitetails more than anything else. Share on XWhat type of grunts were they?
I totally forgot. He did do a buck roar. At one point he did do the roar and that’s the first time that I’ve ever heard that.
It’s wild if you’ve never heard it.
It’s one that I’ve heard people do on TV but I’ve never heard it in person. It was cool to get to hear that.
The longer you’ve hunted, you’re covered up for deer. You made the right move. You hung it when it was windy, wild out and you slipped in there, slipped out of there. You didn’t bump anything. Why don’t you hunt it that night?
The wind wasn’t quite right but that’s not a great excuse. The big thing about why I went in there and hung that stand was because that corn was going to come off any day. When the corn comes off, it totally changes the deer’s patterns at my place as it would any place. I knew if I didn’t get in there and hang that stand and hunt it, it probably wasn’t going to work. I didn’t go in there because I wasn’t 100% sure that I didn’t bump anything or something didn’t see me. I had been seeing more deer come out of that stand in the morning. I said, “Let’s leave the pressure off of it. He’s in there with a doe that’s still bedding there. I’ll leave it and I’ll go hunt it the following morning.”
I hunted cold fronts too. From a distance, he saw the buck behavior. He patterned the buck. The buck was there. He’s watching him. Tell me about the blocks of land. Are they 100 acres, 500 acres, 200 acres, 40 acres?
Both of the places that I have permission to hunt are 200 acres. This one here is right out my back door. The woodblock that I shot in 2018 out of was a ten-acre block of woods, not even quite that big, maybe about eight acres. Up the hill from where I normally hunt is about a 40-acre woodblock. There’s a thick marshy strip that runs along the property to it that’s another five acres of woods all total, but it’s a long narrow strip. I got plenty of woods and then I got a one-acre food plot in the middle of it and then it’s all surrounded by either beans or corn depending on the year.
A lot of places around Columbus, how many marshes do you have on it?
I have little. I call it a marsh, but it’s not super wet because there are two creeks and a couple of ponds. It’s maybe twenty acres or so of a grassy marsh. It’s not super wet. Not thick. Right across the woods in my neighbors, they have a pretty significant 40-acre or 60-acre marsh that’s 200 yards away.
The marshes are great security cover, great bedding areas. It’s hard to approach a buck hanging out in the marsh. Why are you a hunter?
I’ve got to credit my dad for getting me into it. He started taking me hunting when I was three years old. I can’t remember it but I have pictures of me on his shoulders walking me to the deer stand. He started letting me shoot BB guns when I was three. I had a .410 at four. I started shooting rifles at five or six. I have a couple of eight-year-old sisters and I can’t even fathom taking one or two of them hunting with me at that young. I definitely have to credit him getting me into it early. He took his hunting seriously but he didn’t hunt 365 as I do now. He got me into it. I love to hunt. It’s my happy place. Kids in high school they have their basketball, they have their football. I played basketball for a while, but eventually, hunting took over. It’s a new challenge every year. It’s never the same thing. You always got to put a new puzzle together. I’m going to school to be an engineer. It’s the same thing. You’re always trying to solve a new problem or trying to figure something out to get you where you want to be. A lot of times hunting was my getaway, my unplug, go make myself happy and go feel better. It’s always challenging me. That’s why I’m addicted to hunting.
You’re six hours away. How are you a 365 hunter? Do you have Wi-Fi in your trail cameras? How does that work?
I do a lot of my work in the summer. When I’m home I’ll do the food plots and stuff. I have many trail camera pictures that I’m sorting pictures. I’m studying weather patterns with those pictures. I’ll have a group of pictures on September 26 and it was a good day on the cameras. I’ll go back and I’ll keep what was the pressure? What was the wind? What was the temperature? What made that deer move and where did he move? I’m looking at a lot of maps trying to figure out where they are bedding, where they’re feeding, how they’re getting there. Deer are always on the mind for me when I’m not doing homework at school. Do as much research as you can. Something that I’m big into too is historical pictures. If I have pictures of a deer two, three years old, I can go back and I look at those. What was his pattern? When was he here? When was he there? What was he using?
You can tell a lot from your trail cameras. The direction they’re coming and going. Jon Livingston from DeerLab has been on the show and he sorts all that stuff out. If you’re not at least keeping a log with your trail cameras and collecting to build a hit list, you’re missing out on a lot of information. It’s sophisticated now because they can tell you the wind direction, barometric pressure, moon, date and time is easy. There’s so much additional information and then you take that over a number of years and you’ll see a pattern that the biggest bucks like this temperature, this one direction, this barometer, this moon phase. When that happens between the dates of October 28th to November 10th, you should see them in the daylight. Once that happens, get in your stand.
My favorite time to hunt used to be November 5th. I still won’t miss it for the world, but my new favorite time to hunt is the first cold front after October 20th because it’s that stage where nobody’s been out in the woods hunting them hard yet. I’ll go out the early season but I’ll be careful moving stands a lot, making sure that I’m not putting pressure on it, checking the wind and all that stuff. I’m still going to be in the woods. I know a lot of people don’t go into their woods a lot or they’ll stay out of it. I’m the type that loves to hunt. I’m going to be hunting, but I’m smart about it. I’m going to pick the right wind and I’m going to bounce around stands so that I’m not putting too much pressure on anyone stand. I’ll leave my sanctuaries and whatever. That first cold front after October 20th is when they’re starting to look for those first does and a lot of them aren’t ready yet. What you wind up with is the bucks cruising and bouncing from doe to doe. That’s when the bleat calls and stuff like that can be effective because they’re going to check it out trying to be the first ones to get to those does. That’s another good time that I like to key in on. That first cold front’s when I’ve shot my bucks the last couple of years now bow hunting.
Hunting is a new challenge every year. It's never the same thing. You always got to put a new puzzle together. Share on XI like to rattle during that time. I’ve had some of my best rattling sessions in high deer concentration areas. That’s one thing I’ve found about rattling. The more bucks in the area, the more action you’re going to get.
I did do that this year too. I rattled occasionally and I did have pretty good luck with it. I’ve never had a ton of luck with rattling in big ones. They’re usually the two and three-year-olds. Sometimes I’ll shoot a three-year-old. I’m not a diehard it’s got to be this or that. If it gets me excited and makes me happy, I’m going to shoot it. That’s what anybody should do in my opinion. The rattling I did have better luck in 2018 than I did and that’s attributed to I had more bucks around than unusual and they’re all coming to see what’s going on. That has to do with trying to find the first available doe because they’re thinking there are two bucks over there fighting. There’s probably a doe that they’re going after. I would agree that the rattling that time of the year is pretty effective too.
What’s that bleat sound like, the one that you like to use?
I use the Long Can to bleat call. The Long Can is a long drawn up sound than the normal blat. It seems to be more effective.
What type of sequence do you use when you’re blatting?
I’ll give two in pretty close proximity. I’ll give one and then two and then I’ll wait for ten to fifteen seconds and I’ll give a third. That’s usually what I stick with. If I’m rattling, I’ll grunt with it but with the bleat, I’ll usually stick with a bleat.
There are lots of options. The only thing I can tell our audience is you’ve got to do what works best. Austin gave you some good advice at bleating, later on with grunt calls and then rattling. If we’re going to rattle, have a decoy out there. Have a buck decoy out there, whatever you want to use because when they come in they’re looking, “Where’s this fighting?” and they hear the clashing of the horns and they see one buck and go, “He must have chased the other one off or whatever.” You got to dress up the scene a little bit because if they come in and I’ve had elk do this. You’re calling elk and they’ll come in and they’re looking, “Where’s the bull? Where’s the cow?” If they don’t see it and they might be 100 yards away, but they know where the sound is. If it’s not there it’s like, “What does this mean?” I’m talking mature bull elk, two-and-a-half, three-and-a-half years old. When you go to Colorado, you’ll find that you’re going to be extremely successful because you’re a good whitetail deer hunter.
I hope that carries over. A friend of mine is doing it do-it-yourself on public land and the experience more than anything. The elk on top would be nice.
Where are you going? What part of the state?
We haven’t totally figured it out yet. We have one preference point. We both go to college together so we have meetings set up at designated times to talk about this. We’re going to be deciding pretty quickly. School is pretty tough up there so we haven’t had a ton of time to talk about it, but it’s definitely going to be a priority.
I used to write for goHUNT.com. Go there, they’ve got the best research. I wrote the majority of big game profiles in Colorado. Get in touch with me and I might be able to give you some pointers. They’ve got the best information and they got all the maps and stuff like that. I haven’t written for them for a few years. I did it the beginning but I’m always willing to give some advice. I have people that’ll call me and they want to get like, “Tell me exactly what drainage.” If you folks want that, you’re going to have to pay me. I don’t know how else to say it.
What fun is that if you don’t get to figure in on anything?
What’s the point? First time I came out here, I had read Dwight Schuh’s book. He and Larry Jones, the cow elk call guy, they were running Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. I got to know Dwight and I’ve read his books. I did what he had in his book and I missed a spike bull. I had a guest on before, Jeanette Hall, and I smelled them before I saw them. Keep the wind to your face. Elks smell like a barnyard, they stink. You can’t miss it. It isn’t like anything you’ve smelt before. If your spot and stalking or still hunting dark timber, you can get up close to elk. You have to do it right but you can smell them. I smelled him and he wasn’t twenty yards away when it busted.
First time out there, I took a running shot and I shot underneath him. He was big. I shouldn’t have taken a running shot but I did because I knew he was there and I was all prime. I was at full draw so away it went but never hit him. The thing is you can use your senses to your advantage and then you can pattern out like whitetails. To do that, you have to hunt them from a distance and you have to hunt them where other people aren’t going to pound them. That’s the hard part.
You feel the pressure on them. They’re going to move around. The wind I’ve heard that’s probably the biggest key out there as keeping it in your favor, otherwise they’re gone. Even with hunting deer, you can be walking through the woods sometimes and I’ll smell them before I see them. A lot of times I’ll have that in the rut. You’ll be walking through the woods and you feel like you’re starting to smell something and then all of a sudden one jump up twenty, 30 yards away. I definitely understand that aspect of it.
It’s fun and you’re going to dance with the thermals and elk calling which we don’t have to as many whitetails. If you were in Buffalo County or along the Mississippi or in Hill Country you’ve got thermals there. In places, a lot of people hunt, it’s pretty flat.
You've got to do what works best. Share on XDown home here by Columbus it’s flat. In the other piece that I can hunt where I shot my gun buck that’s up in Jackson County, which is two over from Buffalo. That one has a lot of the hills and ridges. I hunt that completely different than I hunt this down home.
Let’s talk about that. How do you hunt at home?
Down home, it’s the woodblocks with the funnels and the fields. I’ll hunt a lot of fringes or the funnel points where I know they’re coming in or out of the woods or anywhere where the wood next down. Up in Jackson County where there are ridges and valleys, I’ll hunt a lot. I’ll use the land as a funnel instead of the field edges of the woods. Up there, there is a lot of bigger timber. That 200 are all woods as opposed to my 200 down here being about 60% field and 40% woods or so. Up there it’s all woods. You’ve got to focus on the land and how that will funnel them. My favorite is ridges. My best bow stands are on ridges where I can get above them so my wind is above them or stuff like that. They use those like a highway to get from point A to point B from what I’ve seen. I like to gun hunt valleys because the scent isn’t quite as big of a deal with my rifle. When they come into the valley, they’re in trouble. I definitely use the formation of the land more to my advantage there than I would down here.
What about skylighting? On our farm, we’ve got one saddled and significant. If you’re up in your tree stand from the bottom, where they got to climb up to the saddle, they can see you. How do you combat that?
There are quite a few big oak trees up there. I like to try and nestle into an oak tree that’s got a lighter back on it to try and prevent that. I’ve may have been sky-lined once in my life on a buck. You’ll have a doe that comes in close every now and again. I’ve only ever had one sky-line me that I was going to shoot her that upset me. Up there, there are a lot of trees. I try and get into a group of trees to break up my silhouette, but there’s not a ton that you can do sometimes to do it. It’s something that you got to be careful with and the movement in general. The less you move, the less chance they’re going to silhouette you.
It’s tough. When you’re hunting in different terrains, you’re going to figure out how best. Sometimes it’s smart to set up a little further away from that. If it’s a small saddle, set a little way or get on the other side depending on the wind. They come over the hill and their eyeball to you, but then it’s too late because as soon as they top the rear you shoot them.
It’s a double-edged sword to how you hunt that spot. I’d like to pay more attention to my set up than my silhouette in that situation. The scent travels a lot further than they can see me. I don’t worry about figuring it out when they’re in front of me. It’s not a huge problem if you’re smart about where you hang the tree stand. The main trails covering one way, set your stand up so that you’re between the tree and them. You’re not off the side of the tree. Sometimes a lot of those stands, I only hunt the rut when I know it’s good and they’re more preoccupied usually. I hope on the fact that you get away with it.
There are some places I won’t hunt except during rut because of that. It’s because you’re exposed but their minds are on something else. I have a great experience. I had a ten-point buck chasing an eight-point buck. I’m sitting on the ground tucked into a dead tree and they were ten feet away. They were moving but I didn’t get a shot. They were clueless because they hung around and they were checking the doe and chasing the doe behind me, in front of me and they could care less.
The second biggest buck I’ve ever shot, I shot him off the ground out of the wind. The farmer had a radish field out there to put nutrients back into the soil. I’d seen the deer out there every night. It was the first cold front after the 20th. This was in 2013. I didn’t have a stand there but I felt I had to be there. I got him on the ground and there was a bunch of does out in the field and this buck came out to check them. I gave him a bleat call and he came in right to ten yards. I shot him at ten yards off the ground and he had no idea I was there until after I shot him. As long as you got the wind in the right spot and you’ve got him preoccupied, you can get away with a lot more.
I know everybody likes to get in near, but I’ve seen more and more that deer are looking, they’re drilling me, especially does. They know where the stand is and they’re drilling it. I get on the ground within 50 yards of that same stand and they walk right by me. You have to have everything right when you can’t move when it’s got to be in your face. Scent control does work. I was talking with Dan Infalt about hunting marsh bucks. He does what he needs to do to get on those big bucks. You’d think about that and the more people you listen to and YouTube videos and such, there’s no right way. For a long time, we said, “We got to be up in the air.” You can be in a natural blind. You can be in a popup blind. You can be away from the main traffic thing and looking for that buck that’s coming through and scent-checking. What’s been your experience hunting scent checking bucks?
I don’t focus on them a ton but you’ll have your main doe trails and then a lot of those bucks will cross those doe trail perpendicular downwind and check them. I generally don’t focus on them as much unless I got the deer patterned. I’d have to see a deer do that a couple of times for me to leave my corridors to do that. I know a couple of friends of mine down in Iowa, they do that a lot where they’re hunting those buck trails that run perpendicular to the doe trails in the bedding areas. They have a lot of success doing it. A way they find those a lot of times is there’ll be a rub line perpendicular to the doe trails or the bedding areas where those bucks are following and checking. If I was going to do that, I probably can on those rub lines like that.
Reading the sign and then adapting. That’s the biggest thing that I’ve learned from all of my guests and from my writing, my reading and talking with folks. There’s nothing that works all the time, but you learn enough tricks and then it’s game on. Every year’s a different game. Even though it’s the same ten-point buck you’ve been watching a year-and-a-half, two-and-a-half, three-and-a-half and four-and-a-half. Now, it’s five-and-a-half-year deer and you want to get him no more on your hit list. All of a sudden it changes it up. All of a sudden he disappears, not just during the lockdown. He drops off the cameras on August 25th and doesn’t show back up until the seven-nineteen and he hasn’t gone any place. How does that work?
That one I shotgun hunting was the same thing. He was gone. I have him every year in August and then he doesn’t show back up until late or not at all. He showed back up the opening day of gun season. I barely believed it because I didn’t have any pictures of him since August and then all of a sudden there he was. It’s crazy how they can do that, but those bigger, older deer they don’t have to move far. He was chasing a couple of does, that’s what got him out of his area. They don’t have to move far to get what they need in a lot of cases.
When you start journaling and start figuring things out in that buck, he was on a quarter mile from where you shot him. That’s where he spent probably the whole fall, maybe a half-a-mile depending on the terrain and everything. He was still there. That’s the thing that befuddles me like, “I know you’re here, but you know I’m here and you go hole up. You come out and feed and water and everything and you know where the trail cameras are. You know you want to stay away from all of that or it’s not good medicine.” You shot the big buck because he’s doing what he does naturally and that’s why hunting in the rut is so much fun.
They make their mistakes.
If you looked at your whole hunting career and you’ve been doing it for a while, what do you wish you knew a few years ago that you know now that made a huge difference in your hunting, the one big thing?
Every year's a different game, even though it's the same ten-point buck you've been watching for a year and a half. Share on XI can tell you fifteen different things for strategy, but the important part is having fun with it and do what makes you happy with it. I was lucky enough to shoot a couple of big bucks when I was fifteen, sixteen years old and then you go like, “I want to shoot a bigger one next year.” You see the people on TV shooting the big buck and you’re like, “I want to be like them,” but that took a lot of the fun out of it. It was 2016 and I had a couple of bucks around that I knew I’d be more than happy to shoot. I let them go because, “He’s not bigger than my last one.” That’s foolish. I’ve had way more fun in the last couple of years. If a deer gets me excited and I know I’m going to be happy with it, I’m going to shoot the deer. The only reason I wait for a bigger deer in the first place is that I don’t want to be done hunting. It’s not because I wouldn’t be happy with another one and I want the meat certainly, but I don’t want to be done hunting. If I don’t shoot one, I have an excuse to keep going back out. Sometimes dad doesn’t like that too much. He gets a little out of my case about it.
Honestly, having fun with it and to be completely honest with you, I’ve been more successful on years where I’m having fun. I’m doing what makes me happy with it rather than trying to do this or that because somebody else thinks this. That’s the most important thing that a lot of us need to look at. On social media, you’ll see these pages where people will be posting pictures of their deer. The first thing they’ll say is, “It might not be a trophy.” You thought it was a trophy so you don’t have to justify that to me or anybody else on the internet that’s why you want to shoot that deer. You bought your license. You put your work and your time in. If it made you happy, all the power to you. I’ve listened to your show enough and we all want to get together as hunters because we know that we’re not a majority. In Wisconsin, we’re close. There are a lot of us that hunt. Still, I hate seeing when other people are putting other people’s deer down or people feel they have to justify it. That’s what I would encourage is if you want to go hunt, do what makes you happy and have fun with it.
I had to laugh when you said you didn’t want to kill a deer because your season’s over. I was up close and personal with deer numerous times in Wisconsin, the same thing in Nebraska where I hunted. I didn’t want to shoot them. Plus, they didn’t flip my switch on. One of the deer that’s in my office is a 128, 130 class Iowa buck, a perfect ten-point. The biggest thing about him was his brow tines. They’re as big as G2s and G3s. I looked at that. He came out being filled late at night, the sun behind him. I’m going, “What a pretty deer.” I shot him and the people I’m hunting with, the same hunt the guy took a 196 and I said, “It’s the prettiest deer I’ve ever seen. He’s a perfect ten-point. In two or three years, he certainly would have been a Booner. He came out. There he was and there I was. End of story. It’s a gorgeous deer and it’s still the prettiest deer I’ve ever killed and I’ve killed a couple bucks. I have him on my wall and I have other bucks in other parts of the house, but he’s right in the thing because he’s the prettiest deer I ever saw.
You’re proud of the deer and that’s all that matters.
You’re passionate about hunting. You want to be happy. Let’s talk about the future of hunting because there’s a lot of stuff going on now. You hit on social media, we’re our own worst enemies. I shoot a doe and somebody says, “Why did you shoot a doe?” I wanted to eat her plus we get too many does on the farm. You ever heard of QDMA and balanced herd? I don’t know why people do that because I don’t care for spike buck if it’s legal. You get a tag and it makes you happy, shoot the sucker.
When I go talk to a lot of friends that meet me for the first time or have known me through a friend, they’re like, “You’re the guy that shoots those deer.” They always want to talk to them about deer. The first thing they’ll say is, “How do I shoot a big deer? How do I do this?” and they’ll be pulling up maps and whatever. In some cases, you don’t have that. That’s why I try and tell them, “I’m fortunate enough to have the good land to do it and whatever, but you might not have that by yours. I’m fortunate to have good neighbors and stuff like that.” As far as the future goes, you’re not going to have that because there’s always a competitive side of people. I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t want to shoot a big buck. People like the bragging rights and I get it, but you’ve got to band together and enjoy it and embrace everybody that wants to hunt. We’re all a big family in a sense with it.
The key to making sure the future for hunting is successful is the youth and trying to get people involved. I have twin eight-year-old sisters. I started young. It’s tough to get them out when they’re that young. My one sister shows a lot of interest in hunting. She helped me cut shooting lanes and put food plots in. I told her, “In the summer, do you want to go help me? I’ll take you hunting.” She’s all excited so I took her. It was October 15th or 16th that I took her out and she loved it. She got to see her first buck making a scrape, chasing does. She even videoed me shooting over the back of a turkey so she wasn’t impressed with that. She’s definitely getting into it.
There was another buck that had a pretty bad limp. I’d seen him in the field behind my house. I went out and shot him. They got home right at dark. I called and they said they want to come and track it. My dad pushed on his phone, “Do you guys want to come to track it?” They go, “Yes, let’s go.” They’re all excited about it. I let them come out and track the deer. Getting them involved and getting them involved early. The earlier they get involved and exposed to it, the easier it is to pick up. I’m pretty sure both of them will be hunters here shortly. I started teaching them how to shoot a bow and a gun. I’m hopeful that maybe with the gun they can go out. Wisconsin changed their law so that they can go out at a younger age with a mentor. Hopefully, I can get them involved. They definitely think they will. That’s the key as far as the future of hunting goes.
Austin, I appreciate that. We’re with Austin Bittner of Columbus, Wisconsin, a 365 hunter. You’ll hear more from Austin in the future on the show because I’ve sure enjoyed having you as a guest on the show.
I enjoyed it too, Bruce. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you.
Important Links:
- Austin Bittner
- Jon Livingston – previous episode
- goHUNT.com
- Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation
- Facebook: https://www.Facebook.com/engineered2hunt/
- Instagram: https://www.Instagram.com/engineered2hunt/
- YouTube: https://www.YouTube.com/channel/UCE8_pJN-G5Bk92xYH57g1Pg
About Austin Bittner
Hi, my name is Austin Bittner. I’m a 21-year-old from Columbus Wisconsin. I have been hunting with my family since I was 3 years old. I am currently a 4th year engineering student at Michigan Tech in Houghton Michigan.
My life pretty much revolves around school and hunting. Hunting is a 365 day a year thing for me. Anything from food plots to trail cameras to actually hunting. I recently started Engineered to Hunt with a good friend of mine to document our adventures and look forward to sharing that with friends and family.
Social media links: