Wes Delks
Role: recurring guest
Appears in 14 episodes
Wes Delks appeared 14 times on the show, on mic each time. He discusses land management and consulting, including evaluating cover access, balancing ‘holdability’ and ‘huntability,’ and searching onX and plat maps for farms. He describes practices like tree planting and switchgrass cover, trail-camera trends on his Indiana and Kentucky properties, saddle sales, and Real World’s Miscanthus product, for which he takes dealer inquiries by email. He answers listener questions on rope scrapes, bedding areas, and hunting pressured bucks, and relays hunting philosophy attributed to Don.
Appearances
What they said
banter
- Wes jokes that despite Don’s kind introduction, he can’t take him seriously wearing that hard hat. 16:35 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
- Wes jokes that the spot to see him shirtless is next to a billboard sign depicting Terry as a ballet dancer. 37:29 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
- Wes Delks clarifies he has never been a model and never will be, correcting Terry’s joke. 63:42 — Episode #57 - Discussion about Ethics Continues as guest at the 2nd Master Class put Don on the spot with live questions.
booner
- Wes relays Don’s advice that if you want to kill a Boone and Crockett buck, you have to hunt where one actually lives. 29:22 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
cover
- Wes reports adding roughly 7-8 acres of tree planting and 17 acres of switchgrass this year, bringing his property to over 25 acres of new cover. 23:13 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
human-intrusion
- Wes explains that after not hunting the new property at all last year, by January he had 25-30 deer regularly feeding at his feeder, far more than the property had ever held before. 24:11 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
hunting-discipline
- Wes describes hunting his target buck only twice in the first twenty days because he was struggling to get the wind he needed. 11:46 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL
hunting-philosophy
- Wes relays Don’s earlier saying that a hunter should be judged by what deer they pass up, not just by what they shoot. 58:49 — Episode #87 - BUCK DOWN! Lester’s Feet Raffle Winner Got it Done!
land-management
- Wes tells consulting clients they must ask whether they can access cover from multiple directions when evaluating a farm’s potential. 17:00 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL
- Wes describes balancing two properties of a farm he calls holdability and huntability when managing deer movement. 27:20 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL
landowner-relations
- Wes shares that he and his wife Madison invited the local conservation officer, who previously hunted the property, and his family over for dinner to build a friendship. 24:45 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
logging
- Wes says that although loggers cut into his corn, it worked out well by creating greens between cover and standing grain he plans to leave. 27:35 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
permission-strategy
- Wes shares that making maple syrup each February with his wife Madison has become a great icebreaker for asking neighboring landowners permission to tap their maple trees. 35:04 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
property-management
- Wes advises hunters to manage their property to bring deer trails closer to the stand rather than repeatedly relocating the stand. 49:33 — Episode #87 - BUCK DOWN! Lester’s Feet Raffle Winner Got it Done!
property-search
- Wes describes compiling a list of 30 to 40 properties in his target county using onX and plat maps while searching for his farm. 20:35 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
real-world
- Wes Delks said Real World’s Miscanthus stays standing through winter and has denser leaf mass than competing Miscanthus varieties, forming a wall faster. 44:58 — Episode #12 2020 ATA SHOW from Indy - Part 1 of 2
- Wes Delks said Real World consulted multiple universities and plant breeders and has been assured their Miscanthus variety is not invasive. 47:13 — Episode #12 2020 ATA SHOW from Indy - Part 1 of 2
- Wes Delks said prospective Real World dealers can email him directly to get started as a dealer. 48:13 — Episode #12 2020 ATA SHOW from Indy - Part 1 of 2
saddle-hunting
- Wes shares that a guy reached out to him on Facebook Messenger about saddles, and Wes ended up selling him one. 25:51 — Episode #87 - BUCK DOWN! Lester’s Feet Raffle Winner Got it Done!
trail-camera-strategy
- Wes says that on his farm, missing a target buck’s trail-camera picture for three straight days means the buck isn’t there anymore. 28:19 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL
trail-cameras
- Wes reports having nine bucks over 140 inches on camera across his Indiana and Kentucky properties this year. 30:10 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
- Wes notes that last year in Illinois and Kansas he had almost 30 bucks over 140 inches on camera, triple this year’s count. 30:18 — Episode #132 - 2022 Buck Forecast Part 1
wind-conditions
- Wes recalls an unprecedented ten-day stretch of easterly winds in late September in Indiana that disrupted his hunting plans. 11:20 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL
Questions they asked
- Wes Delks asks Terry how his deer hunting has changed since meeting Don. 63:54 — Episode #57 - Discussion about Ethics Continues as guest at the 2nd Master Class put Don on the spot with live questions.
- Wes Delks asked what aerial-view characteristics make an ideal property to buy or lease. 3:39 — Episode #17 - Live from Don Higgins first Master Class of 2020
- Wes Delks asked Don to forecast, forty years out, what changes hunters will face and what it will take to stay successful. 60:10 — Episode #17 - Live from Don Higgins first Master Class of 2020
Questions they answered
- Terry asks Wes what it’s like to hear the podcast tell embarrassing stories or poke fun at him when he isn’t there to defend himself.
Wes says he doesn’t get to jab back on the podcast, but that’s part of having fun with good friends. 1:33 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - Terry asks whether nutrition merely helps a buck reach its genetic antler ceiling or actually raises that ceiling.
Wes says achieving big antlers requires age, nutrition, and genetics together. 37:20 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - Terry asks whether nutrition merely helps a buck reach its genetic antler ceiling or actually raises that ceiling.
Wes explains that in the captive deer world, genetics produce thousand-inch antlers, but deer still must be fed properly to reach that potential. 37:26 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - Zane Baldwin from Hastings, Nebraska asks why deer stopped hitting his rope scrape after chewing the end frayed, and how to fix it.
Wes says the same thing happened on his farm, so he just hung a second rope next to the frayed one, calling the spot ‘double rope’. 41:48 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - Zane Baldwin from Hastings, Nebraska asks why deer stopped hitting his rope scrape after chewing the end frayed, and how to fix it.
Wes recommends hanging a new rope right next to the old chewed one rather than replacing it. 42:03 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - Brandon Carroll from Chestertown, Maryland asks how to distinguish doe bedding from buck bedding during postseason scouting.
Wes says he narrows a bedding buck down to a several-acre area rather than one exact spot. 46:25 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - John Simoneau from Clifton, Illinois asks how to hunt a buck that uses the same daylight trail regardless of wind direction in December and January.
Wes agrees there’s a direct correlation between hunting pressure and how much a buck respects the wind. 52:02 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - John Simoneau from Clifton, Illinois asks how to hunt a buck that uses the same daylight trail regardless of wind direction in December and January.
Wes references an article by Al Foster about finding the ‘weak spot’ when hunting a high-pressure area. 52:16 — Episode #248 - Big Buck Down! Wes Delks Joins Us to Discuss UHAUL - What’s the best advice for someone with small, long-term permission ground that holds a lot of big mature bucks but has very limited stand positions?
Wes adds that he’s always trying to secure new hunting permissions. 41:32 — Episode #87 - BUCK DOWN! Lester’s Feet Raffle Winner Got it Done! - Where are you going to be based out of, and how far are you willing to travel for consulting?
Wes says he’s based out of Illinois and Indiana but travels as far as needed, having covered 14 states last year. 24:38 — Episode #87 - BUCK DOWN! Lester’s Feet Raffle Winner Got it Done!
Unofficial fan project. AI-synthesized from public episodes; may contain errors.