Good Friday morning, friends!
Trying something a little different this week. No videos. Just me and you, like we’re sitting in the truck before daylight, coffee going cold in the holder, talking about the only things that matter this time of year.
Here’s the one on my mind.
You can only be in so many places at once.
That’s the whole problem with October, and it’s the best problem a man ever had. Let me walk you through my week, because I think a lot of you are living the same beautiful mess right now.
— Dwayne
ON THE WATER
The river flooded, so I went looking
The main river I fish is blown out right now. Flooded. The kind of high, muddy water that would ruin most guys’ week and send them home to mow the yard.
It didn’t get me down even a little.
Because musky fishing is in prime time, and when one door shuts, the water just points you at another one. I moved off the big river and onto smaller streams and some real good musky lake water, and I’ve been hammering it. Water temps are down in the 60s now, and that’s the magic number. The musky are feeding up hard, packing it in before winter locks everything down. When the water cools, they get serious, and so do I.
So that’s where my mornings have been going. And I’ll be honest with you about my hardest decision every single day right now.
I wake up and I’ve got to choose. Am I taking the new boat out for musky, or am I slipping into the deer woods? Lately it’s been musky, and here’s why. I’m waiting on the rut. I’m holding my fire in those woods, letting it build, because I know what’s coming. So the fish get my mornings in the meantime.
I know. It’s a bad problem to have. Poor me, right?
THE RUT REPORT
Dialing it in before the magic
Here’s where the woods stand, and why I’m being so patient.
We’re in the final stretch now. The bachelor groups are breaking up. Those summer buddies are splitting off, getting territorial, getting mean. And the scrape lines are coming alive. If you’ve walked your ground lately you’ve seen them, those fresh pawed-out spots under a licking branch. That’s the woods waking up.
It means the rut is close. And the rut is, by far, my favorite time of the whole year. Same as most of you.
So right now, this week, is when the quiet work pays off. Get your equipment dialed in. Shoot your bow until that shot is automatic. Get your gear scent-proof and staged by the door. Do the boring, careful things now, because when the magic hits you don’t want to be fumbling with any of it. You want to be ready to hunt.
This year I’ll be chasing the rut in Illinois and Ohio, and hoping to catch some of it here in West Virginia too. Which brings me right back to where I started.
You can only be in so many places at once.
I can’t be in three states on the same November morning, no matter how bad I want to be. None of us can. So you pick your spot, you trust your homework, and you hunt it with everything you’ve got. Good luck to every one of you.
Let’s go get the best few weeks of the whole year.
CARRY REPORT
Know the line before you cross it
Let’s talk about something most people never think about until it’s already a problem. Traveling with your firearm.
I drove up to Pennsylvania this week. And to get there from West Virginia, I had to cut through Maryland. Three states, one drive. And here’s the thing that’ll bite you if you’re not careful: their gun laws are not the same. Not even close. West Virginia and Maryland might as well be different countries when it comes to how they treat what’s in your vehicle.
That’s the trap. You’re perfectly legal at home, you point the truck down the road, and somewhere around a state line you’ve quietly turned into a criminal without doing one single thing differently.
So here’s the rule, and it’s simple. Before you travel, look up the gun laws for every state you’re going to set a tire in. Not just where you’re headed. Every state you pass through. Learn what you have to declare, how it has to be stored, what you can and can’t carry, and where. Do it before you ever back out of the driveway.
Don’t get yourself in trouble when you don’t have to. That’s the whole game. Know the line before you cross it.
BOOTS ON THE GROUND
This week, I want to do something a little different and honor our teachers.
I know this section usually goes to the folks in uniform, and it’ll go right back to them. But every time I turn on the news lately, there’s another school, another classroom, another teacher who had to think about things no teacher should ever have to think about.
These are people who took a job to teach kids how to read and do their multiplication tables, and somewhere along the way the job started asking them to be willing to stand between a child and the worst thing in the world. A lot of them have done exactly that. Some have given everything doing it.
We don’t thank them near enough.
So this one’s for the teachers. The ones who show up every morning, love other people’s kids like their own, and carry a weight most of us will never fully understand. We see you.
We’re grateful for you. And we’re praying for every classroom in this country.
THE LAST LAUGH
My wife asked me why I keep a loaded gun by the bed.
I told her, “In case of intruders.”
She said, “What about the twelve fishing rods in the garage?”
I said, “In case of intruders that fish.”
One last thing
Whatever you choose to chase this fall, the buck or the musky, Illinois or right here at home, keep it fun. That’s the whole reason we do any of this. Don’t let it turn into another job. Go enjoy the woods and the water while they’re this good.
Wear the brand
Full Rut hats and shirts — $25 at fullrutnation.com
NEXT WEEK
The rut’s almost here. I’ll tell you exactly what I’m seeing as it kicks off.
Musky or deer this week? Hit reply and tell me what you chose. I read every one.
See you Friday.
— Dwayne