Ex-Logger's Drone Rise: 111 Deer Found and Spray Business Launch | The DroneOn Show Ep 36

[00:00:00] Speaker A: All right, guys, welcome back to the Drone on show. I'm Mike, and we have Cameron Hershberger with us today. We're going to talk to Cam about. Is it okay if I say Cam? [00:00:08] Speaker B: You can say Cam. [00:00:09] Speaker A: Okay. About having a thermal drone business. And you also got into spray drones B business, so we'll go through some of those details. But thanks for coming on. [00:00:17] Speaker B: Thanks for having me. [00:00:18] Speaker A: No problem. So you approached me. Was it the first time at Mount Hope show? Probably in maybe the, like, second year? [00:00:27] Speaker B: Yeah, that was last year, I believe. [00:00:29] Speaker A: Okay. Was it just last year? So, yeah, for some reason, I. I was thinking you've been into this a lot longer, because doggone it that I talked to you. [00:00:36] Speaker B: It's been three years that I've been doing the thermal thing. [00:00:39] Speaker A: Okay. [00:00:39] Speaker B: Only you're in the ag business. [00:00:41] Speaker A: Okay. Yep. So the thermal, you've been doing it for three years, and according to what I've been hearing, you've been freaking killing it out there. [00:00:48] Speaker B: It's. It's honestly been overwhelming. I did not. Not imagine it was gonna go like this. It's. It's been amazing. [00:00:54] Speaker A: That's crazy. So just give. Give us a little bit of backstory where you're from. Kind of you're originally from this area, but I also think you did mission work. Or were you in Brazil? [00:01:03] Speaker B: Belize. Belize. [00:01:04] Speaker A: Okay. [00:01:05] Speaker B: So I grew up here in this town, Waynesburg, and grew up here now live about half an hour away. My wife is from Belize, so that's why I live down there for a little bit. [00:01:15] Speaker A: Okay. [00:01:16] Speaker B: Get her green card and paperwork sort of sorted out. We were down there for quite a while. [00:01:21] Speaker A: So you started dating your. Your wife while she was still in Belize? [00:01:24] Speaker B: She was actually going to a Bible college in Indiana, so it made it very convenient. I could just drive over there and stuff. But, yeah, so that. [00:01:32] Speaker A: That's how. That's how you would have met her is through that Bible college. [00:01:35] Speaker B: So my uncle moved down, my cousin got married, and I went down for the wedding, and that's how I met her. [00:01:40] Speaker A: Oh, nice. [00:01:41] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:01:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Because I remember you and I talking about that, about Belize, and you at one point, originally, you were thinking trying to get this technology down there. [00:01:51] Speaker B: That's still the dream. Yeah. Oh, it is. [00:01:52] Speaker A: Okay, nice. So we'll want to get into that at some point in the podcast. [00:01:57] Speaker B: It's very untapped. [00:01:58] Speaker A: No way. [00:01:59] Speaker B: It's a small country, but there's a lot of potential. A lot of farming down there too. [00:02:03] Speaker A: Huh? Okay. Yeah, we'll touch on that. So you Bought a thermal drone. Were you, were you going at this as it's going to be a little side gig or were you like, I'm going all in. [00:02:12] Speaker B: Originally it was kind of a side gig thing. I kind of looked at it probably differently than most people did. I was very interested in the helping the hunter side of things. So I was actually looking at getting a dog, which I'm not a huge dog person. And then I started seeing your videos with thermal drones. I'm like, hey, that makes perfect sense. Right? I can evenings help people. I had another full time job I was doing, but found out very quick having a full time job and then trying to do that on the side is not as easy. [00:02:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Because oftentimes when somebody calls you, they want it done. They want it done. [00:02:46] Speaker B: If you can't come now, they're calling the next guy. Yeah. [00:02:48] Speaker A: Yep. [00:02:48] Speaker B: So I did that. Tried to juggle both. And then last, before last season, I actually just quit my full time job and this is what I do now. [00:02:56] Speaker C: Geez. [00:02:57] Speaker B: And it's been. [00:02:58] Speaker A: That's wild. [00:02:59] Speaker B: Good decision. [00:02:59] Speaker A: Are you a. Are you a deer hunter yourself? Like, yeah. Do you spend a lot of time in the woods? [00:03:04] Speaker B: That's my passion is hunting. I love going like western hunting. And I'm planning another trip to Alaska. Like, I just love adventure and hunting. [00:03:12] Speaker A: Alaska. What are you gonna hunt in Alaska? [00:03:14] Speaker B: Hopefully caribou. That's the nice. [00:03:16] Speaker A: Like with rifle or bow or. [00:03:18] Speaker B: We're gonna try with bow. And then if we. [00:03:20] Speaker A: Depends how it goes. [00:03:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:03:22] Speaker A: Reach out there a little bit farther. [00:03:24] Speaker B: Once we give up. [00:03:25] Speaker C: So question. Do you need a cameraman for this Alaska hunt? [00:03:28] Speaker B: Just. Just cameraman free? [00:03:30] Speaker C: No, but we might be able. Real cheap. [00:03:34] Speaker A: Real cheap. Oh, that'd be cool. Okay, so how do you have time to hunt here in Ohio when you're doing recoveries? [00:03:44] Speaker B: I don't. That's a good question. And it's kind of frustrating. Not frustrating because I'm. I love helping people. Like, it's. I have almost just as much fun going out and finding someone's deer as I do hunting. [00:03:54] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:03:55] Speaker B: But I get to hunt when the hunting's bad. So this time of the year it slows down. The deer pressured. [00:04:00] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:00] Speaker B: That's when I get the hunt. I mean, fortunately, I shot my buck year. [00:04:03] Speaker A: Oh, you did. Nice. [00:04:04] Speaker B: So I get to go out here and there. But often it's trying to take phone calls on the tree stand and try to not talk loud and have to get out of the stand. But that's part of the job. [00:04:13] Speaker A: Yeah. I just put a video out of me getting called off the stand to go do a recovery. It's like, it's something that if you're going to do this type of business, it's probably going to happen. [00:04:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:04:22] Speaker A: And if you're not. If you're not willing to get off your stand to go help somebody, you probably won't make it really big. Now there's definitely going to be guys that are doing thermal drone businesses that are just really, really a side gig thing. But, like, how many have you found this year? It's. [00:04:38] Speaker B: I need to check my phone. I believe 111 is where we're at. [00:04:42] Speaker A: That is nuts to think how many thermal drone pilots are in our area. What are you doing differently to get all those jobs? [00:04:53] Speaker B: That's a good question. Because I don't feel like I've been. If you see all these advertisements and people pushing it, which is a good thing. One thing that help your guys's map subscription, which if any of you guys are listening, that's a good thing to get on. But I think customer service, I mean, that's the biggest thing. So I don't have a side job. I can show up, I can spend four hours with the customer until they're content or satisfied, or we move three times, or somebody doing it as a side job, they gotta get home and get to bed because they gotta get up early in the morning. [00:05:21] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm gonna speak into that. That is one thing that I have a little bit of a problem with with people getting into. It is a. They've heard how good the money can be, but if they're there only for that, just for the money, it starts to become an issue because you feel pressured. You don't want to be there. You just want to move on to the next one. That's a problem. So hearing that you're there to help the hunter, those are the type of people I want on my platform because that's what I've been given people when they call drone deer recovery is my ultimate goal is I want to. It just frustrates the crap out of me if it can't find your deer. So I'm there to find your deer. And of course, the money is like a bonus if I end up finding them. [00:05:58] Speaker B: Yeah, you can't do it for free, obviously. Like, I have to make a little bit of money to pay for my gear, my gas and my time. But it's. I lay at bed at night thinking about deer I couldn't find. That's how much it bothers me 100%. And normally I'll get a text a week later, a couple days later, hey, he's back on trail camera. Okay, good. Like it makes me feel better. [00:06:17] Speaker A: So do you have children? [00:06:19] Speaker B: I do. Yeah. [00:06:20] Speaker A: You do have children. So you're gone probably through the night a lot. How's. How's the wife take to this? [00:06:25] Speaker B: She accepts it. Because I was a logger before this, which isn't the safest job. I've had a couple injuries. I had two knee surgeries already. Not logging related, but I fractured my back. Logging related. My shoulder. It's not. [00:06:38] Speaker A: We gotta get into that. [00:06:39] Speaker B: Not been the best. [00:06:40] Speaker A: Wait, how old are you? [00:06:41] Speaker B: 28. [00:06:43] Speaker A: You're young. [00:06:44] Speaker B: Yeah. So it was kind of one of those things. It's like I saw where this was going to and I was like, I need to find something that's a little easier on my body. [00:06:50] Speaker A: And yeah, this is kind of like me and being an arborist, like climbing trees is one of those things. Like it's not if you get hurt, it's when and how bad exactly. [00:07:00] Speaker C: How did you get into it? Is it a family thing or the logging? [00:07:03] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So my uncle owns a logging business and I had. Ever since I was a little boy, I wanted to. And finally When I was 15, my parents were like, okay, if that's what you want to do, we'll drive you over there every morning at 4:00 clock in the morning. And that's how I started. Wow. Since I was 15 doing that. [00:07:18] Speaker A: And how many years would you have done logging? [00:07:21] Speaker B: Probably around 12 years. [00:07:23] Speaker A: Wow. [00:07:24] Speaker B: It was on and off. [00:07:25] Speaker A: So I did that. That line of work for a little bit. Were you the cutter or the skidder driver? [00:07:31] Speaker B: Mostly skidder driver. But I did about three years of cutting too. [00:07:35] Speaker A: Okay. [00:07:36] Speaker B: Both. [00:07:37] Speaker A: I was mostly the skidder driver and then I did some of the cutting. But I'd say I wasn't probably a good cutter. Yeah, there's definitely people that are friggin good at doing it. Like felling the trees, trying to get them in in a way that's easy for the skitter driver to pick them up and get them out of there. [00:07:53] Speaker B: It's. It's an artwork. [00:07:55] Speaker A: I. I believe you and I, the people that do that line of work. Most of the stuff in our area is select timber harvesting in hardwoods. You know, the cutting of timber like that's on TV shows. A lot of that stuff is clear cutting, moving the big wood for two by fours and building that type of stuff. But what you and I would have done. Yeah, it's. It's an art. There's no doubt about that. [00:08:16] Speaker B: And here. The other was a couple weeks ago, my uncle called me. He's like, hey, can you fill in for a day? I got something going on. So I was like, sure, I'll fill in. Well, that day, I watched the cutter break his leg. So I was like, yeah, you know what? This drone thing is just a little safer than what happened. He was topping a tree, and there's pressure on the limb, and it didn't really look like it, and just snap back. [00:08:37] Speaker A: I know. It's so fast, too. Like, dude, I could we. You know, you and I could probably sit here and tell stories every day of something that was really a close call in timber harvesting. There's literally not a day that I. I feel like I went to the woods and that wasn't something that almost tried to either kill me or run me over or smack me in the face. There's this one time I was cutting this dead tree. Dead tree. And I'm cutting it, and my brother's on the skitter, and he bumped a tree that. Bumped the tree that I was cutting. And just like. Just a little bit, and the top broke off, like, a little section of the dead thing, and it whacked me on the top of my helmet. I'm like, days trying to figure out, like, what just happened. It's like those types of things getting out of the skin regular. Yeah. Yeah. [00:09:25] Speaker B: It's just you're cutting a tree and whomp. Something comes down. You're like, oh, that was close. That wakes you up. And you're like, okay, I better take this seriously. [00:09:32] Speaker A: Yeah. But it's like, we tried to be as cautious as we could. I get out of the skidder. I'm looking up, right. Looking for hangers first before I start walking around. I thought I looked everywhere. And then here comes a random one, like, you're saying comes back down. Yeah. So we need people that cut trees. But I'm glad I don't do it. [00:09:50] Speaker B: Yeah, me neither. Especially this weather. [00:09:52] Speaker A: Right now. [00:09:52] Speaker B: I'm sitting at home drinking a coffee during the day, looking out like, man, that must suck out there. [00:09:58] Speaker A: Yeah, that's true. So you did Approximately this season? 100 and some. How many did you do last season? [00:10:04] Speaker B: Just over 100. Gee, 104. [00:10:06] Speaker A: That is wild. So you're on the drone deer recovery pilot locator map. What else type of marketing do you do? [00:10:14] Speaker B: Honestly, not much. I mean, I have a Facebook page, but I don't I'm not super active on it. It's mostly word of mouth. [00:10:21] Speaker A: Okay. [00:10:21] Speaker B: Since I am a hunter, I'm very integrated in the hunting community. That helps a lot. And it's. It's pretty much been, if you show up, do a good job, whether you're. The deer's dead or alive, no matter what happens, the customer's satisfied, happy with the price, you go home. That's who he's calling next time. Or if his buddy hits a deer. Hey, I know this guy. Like, I rarely get calls that it's someone that doesn't know me or doesn't have a buddy. [00:10:46] Speaker C: That. [00:10:47] Speaker A: That's so cool. [00:10:48] Speaker B: So I think customer satisfaction is, like, huge. [00:10:50] Speaker A: Yeah. And you showing up, like, every time, not giving it an option to call somebody else is probably a big call. [00:10:57] Speaker B: Hey, how long is it? 20 minutes, half an hour? An hour. Like, I drop what I'm doing if I can, and go. [00:11:02] Speaker A: Yeah. So if somebody's going to try to make this, take the pointers that these guys are giving you, it's like, if you want to make it really successful, there's going to be a lot of sacrifices from, you know, if you're married, your wife going out running through the night, that type of stuff. You're running the Matrix 30T. [00:11:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:11:23] Speaker A: With the JZT 60 light. You had some issues. You call me one night, you're like, this thing's not working. What ended up being the issue, do you know? [00:11:30] Speaker B: I'm honestly not sure. So actually, somebody on your team sent it in for repair. It just quit working. Guy had hit a big buck in the shoulder. And so I knew I wasn't looking for a dead deer, but you can't really. You still gotta go look. [00:11:44] Speaker A: Gotta go look. [00:11:45] Speaker B: Light quit working 20 minutes into the search. And I'd kind of search the main area. And he was. Customer was pretty upset. So I actually called Dennis because he was. [00:11:54] Speaker A: He was upset at you, at your equipment. [00:11:56] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm like, this is an expensive light. I didn't want it to break. [00:11:59] Speaker A: Yeah. Like. [00:11:59] Speaker B: So I was like, you know what? I'm gonna call Dennis. And I didn't make any profit off this call. Gave all the money to Dennis just for customer satisfaction. He looked for another. I don't know how long. I left after about an hour. And he still. He. I think he moved locations and kept looking. [00:12:14] Speaker A: Never found him. [00:12:15] Speaker B: Never found him. But it was a long time after the shot, and he knew it was shoulder. Didn't get any penetration. And I'm sure, you know, just as well as I do. Shoulder shot deer, they like picking a straight line and leaving. [00:12:26] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And it's like, dude, they walk one miles per hour and you know, a deer walks faster than a mile per hour. [00:12:32] Speaker B: They got four legs, we got two. [00:12:34] Speaker A: Right. Yeah, good point, Good point. [00:12:37] Speaker B: And I ended up texting the guy like, hey, we can't. Can't locate your deer. Like, if anything, you know, an update, let me know. He never responded. [00:12:44] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. So he was a little disgruntled, a. [00:12:46] Speaker B: Little salty, I think, but yeah, well, you run into that in any business. Right. You just got to deal with it and move on. [00:12:52] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. [00:12:53] Speaker C: How long after the shot did he, did he call you guys out? Like, is this two days after. [00:12:58] Speaker B: No, no, it was probably six, seven hours or something like that. [00:13:02] Speaker C: Okay, so you still had a decent window. [00:13:04] Speaker B: Yeah. But as far as thermals, we didn't mess up. [00:13:07] Speaker C: It wasn't like he was messing around and had somebody else out or. [00:13:10] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:10] Speaker A: That being said, how many of those did you have this year where. I had a thermal drone guy already and I'd like for you to look. [00:13:17] Speaker B: For him a lot. Surprising amount. It's. I always joke that especially, especially on the ag side, but even the drone side, like other, other companies have given me more business than they probably realize. Like, they show up, they want to collect their Money, look for 20 minutes and leave. [00:13:35] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:13:36] Speaker B: Even if the deer isn't dead right there, that's the customer. Doesn't they feel ripped off? Right. You got to spend time with the customer. [00:13:42] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:13:43] Speaker B: Search wherever they want. Searched. And. Yeah. Till they're, they're content. Like, customer's always right. [00:13:49] Speaker A: Yeah. So how many, how many would you have found that somebody else didn't find, numbers wise? [00:13:56] Speaker B: I honestly didn't keep track of that. [00:13:58] Speaker A: Okay. Because for me, like I got called. I was getting so frustrated toward the end of the busy season there in November. I was just getting so frustrated of being called out after being the second guy or the third drone guy to come and look. And it's just, it's like if somebody usually spends an hour to two hours and they don't find the deer and then you call me, the chances of me finding the deer are also pretty slim. [00:14:23] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:24] Speaker A: But if it's a 20 minute, 20 minute flight or 15 minute flight. Yeah. There's a chance that I'm going to find. Find your deer. So I didn't know if you had that number. You know, I was called out at least 10 times and I ended up finding the deer five times. I wasn't sure. [00:14:39] Speaker B: One number that surprises me, and I'm not saying this to brag, but how. How good thermal drones and how effective they are is out of, I don't know, 300 some searches I've done. There's one deer that I got a call back, and that was this year that I missed. [00:14:55] Speaker A: Okay. [00:14:55] Speaker B: And that was a deer that was a day after the shot, and it was in a pond, so it obviously cooled off and only part of the body was sticking out. It's frustrating because I flew over the pond. I remember looking at the. Yeah, the drainage pipe. You know how those always heat up. And I even looked at my recording. I looked at that pond. I just didn't see him. [00:15:13] Speaker A: Do you think he was in there when you looked? [00:15:15] Speaker B: I think so, yeah. [00:15:17] Speaker A: So do you think he was. He sank and then Ray came back up once again. [00:15:21] Speaker B: I. Obviously, I don't know because I saw footage and he wasn't holding heat. [00:15:25] Speaker A: Yeah. Because I had one of those this year as well, where it's like, me and Dennis both search for three hours, and they're totally convinced this is where he was. And then we sent. He sent me a picture of where the buck died, and it was on a logging road. I instantly was able to go back to my screen recording. Watch it back. Roll it forward. Watch it back. The deer was. With 1000% certainty the deer was not there when I looked on that logging path. It's not saying that he wasn't somewhere else in the, you know, the search area, but he was definitely not dead there on that logging path. [00:16:03] Speaker B: Yeah, it's. [00:16:04] Speaker A: There is definitely scenarios where the deer that you missed, maybe he was there, but that's not to say that he didn't wander into there later, too. [00:16:14] Speaker B: One thing I've realized about learning about deer is once you think you got it figured out, something happens where you don't. [00:16:20] Speaker A: I'm so glad that guys like yourself are now coming and sharing your experience, because I. I was getting these questions all the time when drone deer was starting to take off, and I was on all these podcasts, and they'd asked me that question, like, are you finding gutshot deer at near water? And it's like, dude, right now, I literally have no pattern. Yes, I have definitely found gutshot deer at water, but I've also found gutshot deer on top of the hill. [00:16:46] Speaker B: Exactly. That's a big one. Everybody's like, well, there's a creek down here. Went to. I'm like, maybe we're going to look there for sure. [00:16:52] Speaker A: Yeah. 100%. [00:16:53] Speaker B: But I'm not. I don't think there's a better chance near that water than there is on the side of that hill. Like. [00:16:58] Speaker A: Yeah. I think this. Sharing these stories will probably make people question was said in the past before we had this technology to prove where the deer is either alive or dead. And that I would say the same thing is I literally have not found a pattern of where these deer are. [00:17:18] Speaker C: So. So going off of that. What is something that has been debunked in your mind? Like something that you. That was pretty standard within the industry. And since you've been using thermals, is there something that is that you found to be untrue that you thought previously was. [00:17:35] Speaker B: I guess one of the biggest things. I guess that was an eye opener for me. And I think most people don't realize is how far deer travel. [00:17:43] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:43] Speaker B: Like, it is insane. Where. Where one evening I was at my uncle's place looking for a wounded deer, and we. We watched a deer walk for close to three miles late season. And he passed like an estimated seven different corn piles to go to a certain corn pile. [00:17:58] Speaker A: Wow. [00:17:59] Speaker B: And that's where he was traveling to. And he was on a mission. And that's late season. They're not supposed to be traveling that far. You know, I mean, like. Right, sure. But that's one thing that is blowing my mind where I'll get a photo or somebody will say they have a photo of a buck and then I go and search. The deer's not there. Like in an area where I won't miss the deer. Yeah, that's a huge one. It's just how much they travel. [00:18:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I would say that's so true. Madison was actually saying that on the last podcast is just how far they go for sure. Well, he said he feels like they go even further in the gun because in gun season. So if they get shot at or something like that, it seems like they just. They just go. I honestly haven't done that many gun recoveries where it's like in the gun season. Don't know why, but my phone hasn't rung that much on gun season calls. Do you. In the rut, do you think that box are tougher than they are, like early season or late season? [00:18:52] Speaker B: So as far as dying, I don't think there's a difference. But as far as how far they'll go, 100%. Like, it is night and day. It seems like you. You yell boo at a deer in early season, they'll run 100 yards and lay down to recover from it. [00:19:05] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:19:06] Speaker B: During the rut, if they can go, they're gonna go. [00:19:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:19:09] Speaker B: It's the amount of times I found a deer with an arrow sticking out of them or blood running on his side and he's chasing. Does like three hours after the shot would blow your mind. And the hunters are like, that's. There's no way that's my deer. And I'm like, who else shot a deer? The same deer. [00:19:24] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:19:24] Speaker B: He's out there chasing. Does like he's fine. [00:19:26] Speaker A: That's crazy. What's the most amount of calls that you've done in like in a day? But it's usually not in a day. [00:19:33] Speaker B: It's like I had a crazy day this year. I Woke up at 5 o' clock in the morning and I got home at around 2:30 at night. And that was 11, 11 calls in a day. [00:19:44] Speaker A: Was it overcast or were you doing them in? [00:19:46] Speaker B: It was raining. [00:19:47] Speaker A: Wow, those are fun. [00:19:49] Speaker B: It was just one to the next. As fast as I could go. I'd get calls between it. It was. That was wild. Yeah. [00:19:55] Speaker A: And most of your area, you don't have to tell us town, but it would be like west of my area toward. Would it be central Ohio? [00:20:02] Speaker B: More central and still northeast. [00:20:05] Speaker A: But mostly woods or corn. Corn over there. [00:20:08] Speaker B: A mixture. It's a little hillier than it is here in some of that area. But what was interesting is all those calls were like in a 20 minute area which is. You know how unusual that is. It's usually one direction, then the other. And this was all on a pile. Actually. I did two searches from the same location for two different people that didn't know each other. No, it was, it was one of those days. The bucks were moving and it was just as fast as I could go. [00:20:32] Speaker A: That sounds like you need a camera guy. [00:20:35] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:20:35] Speaker A: Or just a 360. Put that thing up, just let it run. Yeah, we tried that this year, but honestly, a little hard to keep the footage organized because if you don't organize which buck is what, the editors get all this stuff and it's like, wait, that's not even the deer that I'm talking about. Yeah, but the editors just put it together. [00:20:52] Speaker B: Well, that's like my, my controller was so full of screen recordings I quit screen recording. And then I'd run across. Across something super cool. Didn't have room, had to try to delete something. And so I finally wiped it again. Now we're recording. [00:21:04] Speaker A: So speaking of screen recording, do you screen record to protect yourself, or are you screen recording just because you want to see the cool. Both. Yeah. [00:21:12] Speaker B: Because, I mean, you see some crazy things. I've had encounters with police. [00:21:18] Speaker A: Give us some. Give us some wild stories, because I've shared the story. I've never. I never told people who the operator was, but I. I sent you. I think it was two years ago. I sent you a lead, and then you later told me what type of encounter you had. I mean, that's the worst. That had to be the craziest one. [00:21:34] Speaker B: So I actually. I don't know if I followed up with you on what happened with that deer. [00:21:38] Speaker A: So start from. Start from the beginning so they know what we're talking about. [00:21:44] Speaker B: So it was during the rut last year. I was having a good day, and I just wanted to do more. Like, I was going crazy. So I text Madison. I'm like, hey, like, you got any more? Like, I want to keep rolling. He's like, oh, well, Mike might have some. You sent me a call. Go up, find the deer pretty quickly. Big buck, and he's got shot laying in a creek and looked like he was going to die. [00:22:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:22:04] Speaker B: And this guy's all worked up and stuff, and he's like, hey, here's $1,000. Turn your light on. I'm going to grab the rifle. Go shoot him. [00:22:11] Speaker A: Holy. [00:22:12] Speaker B: I literally got shivers. I'm like, no, this is not happening. Like, I literally brought my drone back, landed it, and I told him, I'm not part of this. Like, what you do when I'm gone, I do this for a living. I know I'm out of here. Like, I don't want to be a part of this. And I recorded the whole thing, and I recorded him saying that, too. And then afterwards, I talked to his buddies. I'm like, don't let him do this. Like, this is going to end badly. [00:22:34] Speaker C: Like, yeah. [00:22:35] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:22:36] Speaker B: So they call me later that night. Hey, we talked him in to wait until the morning. Do you want to come out in the morning again? So I actually went out the next morning. He's laying in the same bed, dead. [00:22:44] Speaker A: Nice. [00:22:45] Speaker B: So who. Yeah. [00:22:46] Speaker A: I did not know that ending. I was just like, I am so glad you got the flock out of there, because, yeah, that is the last thing you want to be involved with is something like that. [00:22:56] Speaker B: And that's. That's what people have an opinion on. Drones. Like, you shouldn't use drones and all this stuff. And I'm like, because people can use them for bad and scouting, and so. [00:23:04] Speaker A: Can he use his Gun for bad. That he was my exact point. [00:23:07] Speaker B: I'm like, you can't blame the tool. Blame the person. You're going to have bad people using good things for bad reasons. That's how it works. Sure. We need regulations. I believe there should be pretty strict regulations on some of this stuff because people are abusing it. But that doesn't mean you just ban it for everyone that are using it for good. Like the amount of deer, out of those 111 deer that I found this year, I don't know how many of those people walked within 20 hours of that deer and would have given up if I wouldn't came out. That's how many wasted deer. Yeah, that would be laying out there rotting. [00:23:37] Speaker A: Dude is pretty wild to think that there's states that don't. They say use all means necessary. But not this one. The. The state that's just pissing me off right now is Illinois. They just came out and said, you cannot look at a deer with a thermal drone anytime. Deer season. No deer season. Can't do it. [00:23:59] Speaker B: How are they going to enforce that? I was looking at the sunset. [00:24:03] Speaker A: That's what I'm saying. I was like, well, wait, what if I'm flying my airplane around, I see a deer out the window? [00:24:08] Speaker B: Got to close your eyes. [00:24:09] Speaker A: Yeah, that's my point. Yeah. So I brought that up with Madison. He was like, well, he pro. He's not the pusher. [00:24:19] Speaker C: What you were saying, like, it's a firstborn thing. Yeah, firstborns follow. Follow the rules. [00:24:25] Speaker A: Are you first born? [00:24:26] Speaker C: Tell me what. [00:24:26] Speaker A: Oh, you are. [00:24:27] Speaker C: Tell me what I can do, what I can't do. And Mike, you are second youngest. [00:24:32] Speaker A: Yeah, well, no, I'm third. Well, I have three siblings. Yeah, it's. It's my sister, my brother. They're older. And then I have a sister that is 11 and a half years younger than me. Yeah, but yeah. Yeah, Interesting. Anyhow, Illinois, if you're watching this, talking about pushing boundaries. Yeah, I'm going to push your boundaries because I'm going to come out there, I'm going to have a 25 acre lease and I'm going to fly my drone looking for trespassers. And sure, I will see deer. [00:24:58] Speaker B: Okay, just close your eyes real quick. Keep going. So that's speaking about drones. It seems drones freak people out. I don't know what it is. I had, I maybe had the cops called on me like half a dozen times the entire time since I've been doing that, and three of those were in the same week. I Was getting tired of it. [00:25:18] Speaker A: Whoa. [00:25:18] Speaker B: People see a drone flying around, make up some wild story. The one that stuck out to me the most this year was I was looking for this guy's deer in pretty flat ag country, and all of a sudden a car just tears in, blocks my truck and gets out, cusses us out and refuses to talk to us. And you could hear him on the phone with the cops. I just told the hunter. I'm like, let's just relax. We're not doing anything wrong. I'm licensed. Let's just keep looking for the deer and he'll do whatever he's doing. Yeah, well, he showed up and he told the cops that we were hovering low over his house, looking in the window, seeing if his car was at home because we're gonna rob his place. Okay. That's a crazy person that. [00:25:55] Speaker A: I had one happen like that too. Why do they always go with. You're looking into the windows. [00:26:00] Speaker B: And what was interesting is I had recorded the flight pattern. I didn't even fly over the guy's house. I was at like 400ft the entire time. Like, that's why screen record and stuff. Because, yeah, you're going to run into crazy people. They see a drone flying, they don't know why. They instantly go to the worst case scenario. It's like, you're not that interesting. [00:26:16] Speaker A: I'm not looking at you exactly like, dude, do what cam is saying. Screen record. It is so easy to screen record. Like, I don't know if you use a shortcut, but you hit the back button and then record button. Like, boop, boop it. Boom. Instantly start screen recording. It's so good. I cannot stress that enough. So did the cop come out and he was like, what are you doing? [00:26:38] Speaker B: Yeah, he was annoyed at the guy. He's like, well, he's not doing anything wrong. What do you want me to do? And he's like, there's got to be a law. You can't just fly over people's property. It's like, oh, that's not how it works. [00:26:48] Speaker A: Oh, okay. [00:26:49] Speaker B: I try to be respectful. [00:26:51] Speaker A: Let's talk about this. It's. It's not a thing yet. So I don't want to make it a big thing, but there is new legislation proposed in the state of Ohio that would not allow drones to fly on anybody's property other than your own. [00:27:04] Speaker B: How's that going to work? [00:27:05] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:27:06] Speaker B: Wow. Is there. No. [00:27:08] Speaker C: At what altitude? [00:27:09] Speaker A: Anything. [00:27:09] Speaker C: Any altitude. [00:27:10] Speaker A: Anything? Yep, that's lers. It's lers. Like that person There that you had to run in. That is a Leslator. And he's like, well, you shouldn't be able to do that. Like, so you can't do it. I don't think it'll ever get legs. I don't think it'll ever go anywhere. But that is a problem. Right? Like people that have power, that don't understand how this technology works and how drones work, they just get scared thinking that, oh geez, everybody's just spying on me. And then they write this stupid bill that could literally affect us. [00:27:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:27:40] Speaker A: Again, it doesn't have legs yet. It's just an initial write up. But that is crazy. There's also another one that would give anybody with a shotgun, legally possessed shotgun to allow to shoot the drone out of the sky. [00:27:54] Speaker B: Like just because it's flying over your place or. [00:27:56] Speaker A: Yeah, but the funny part was certain height. [00:27:59] Speaker C: It was like the shotgun is legal to be able to shoot a drone. [00:28:02] Speaker A: Out, but you have to legally own the shotgun. It says that right in that. Were you still there when he was saying it? [00:28:08] Speaker C: Yeah, it is. [00:28:08] Speaker B: So don't use an illegal shotgun to shoot the drone. [00:28:12] Speaker A: Yeah, well, the, the thing is, you know, they're, the state is trying to do their own thing, but that's a federal, it's federal like, so it's not going to. Just because the state says that it's a thing doesn't mean it's going to be a thing. It's federal. We the people own the national airspace system. You own it, I own Atlanta owns it. And everybody else that's listening to this in the states own the airspace. [00:28:33] Speaker C: And some of, some of these, it feels like it's a, someone is proposing it and they're in a place and then they can, they can pat themselves on the back and go back to their supporters and their constituents and say, I made an attempt to pass something and they know, even if they know that nothing's ever going to happen or come of it, they can at least go like this. And this kind of goes along with, you know, going green and emissions and, and stuff like that. A lot of that stuff is, well, we tried. Even if they know that nothing's ever going to come of it, they can pat themselves on the back and kind of add it to their resume as a person in the legislature. Yeah, that's what I think some of that is, is posturing. And, and they can write it down. Well, we tried, but it got shot down. [00:29:19] Speaker A: Yeah, I haven't talked to, talked about it much because I really don't want to ruffle feathers because it's really not a thing. But it's like everything else. It starts off not being a thing, and then all of a sudden it becomes a thing. It's like the whole DJI band that we're dealing with. I never thought that that's actually going to be a thing, but they got enough people talking in legislative power. It's doggone starting to look like it's tomorrow's 23rd. You know, they'll probably be put on the COVID list. That doesn't mean that your M30T that you have and the four TDS and the four T's will be allowed to have those things. But what about the M40T? You know, that would be cost effective. Fly better, fly faster, all those things. [00:30:00] Speaker B: Yeah, there's nothing competing with. [00:30:02] Speaker A: Not even close. [00:30:03] Speaker B: I looked into other drones and stuff. It's like, especially on the thermal side, there's nothing I even want. [00:30:08] Speaker A: It's laughable. It's absolutely. But the good thing is, you know, I think that the technology we have as of right now will still be very valuable for three to five years, I think. But we'll see. That was a cool story about the cops. What is the craziest, not craziest, but the most rewarding recovery that you would say that you've done? [00:30:28] Speaker B: Most rewarding? All of them? No, I love ones with kids, where the kids get excited and like, that's like. So youth season. A couple of us guys team together and we do free searches for youth season. [00:30:40] Speaker A: I've seen that going on, and that's. [00:30:42] Speaker B: Usually the highlight of my year because it's all just youth hunters. And a lot of times, unfortunately, the parents don't want to pay to have the kids deer shot. It might be small buck or doe or something. That's kind of why we do it, just to help the kids out. I really enjoy that. [00:30:56] Speaker A: That's cool. [00:30:58] Speaker B: One that I'll probably never forget is one evening I got a call from a guy, Hey, I just shot a deer. It ran away, didn't fall over. What do I do? I'm like, okay, like, what? What happened? Like, did you hit it? Yeah, pretty sure I hit it. It's. It's, it's. I think it's a big buck. Like, okay, like, find the arrow. Yep, yep. What colors? The blood. Oh, it's red. I'm like, okay, this guy. This is my first time hunting. [00:31:20] Speaker A: Oh, I was gonna say, sounds like this guy. [00:31:22] Speaker B: This is making sense. I wasn't sure where this was going. It's like, okay, I'll come out, you know, take a look for you, whatever. And I show up, and he shows me a trail camera photo of this buck. Things huge. [00:31:33] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:31:33] Speaker B: The biggest deer I've ever seen in my life. [00:31:35] Speaker A: No. [00:31:35] Speaker B: And I find the thing bedded in a corner of a woodlot, Gut shot, still alive. So I told him, you know, just don't go in there. Let's just back out. I'll come back tomorrow morning. [00:31:45] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:31:45] Speaker B: So the next morning, we come back, he's laying back there dead. And he goes back, drags. Drag this deer out. Once I saw this chair, I was like, oh, my goodness. Like, this guy has no idea what he just shot. No way. I mean, this thing is massive. And it's laying there. And he's like, you think it'll go 150? And I'm like, oh, my goodness. Like, I bet it'll go over 200. He's like, no, there's no way it'll go over 200. [00:32:06] Speaker C: Oh my goodness. First time hunting ever. [00:32:08] Speaker A: He. [00:32:09] Speaker B: Well, I think it was his second hunt. He borrowed his buddy's crossbow, put a blind up behind his grandma's place, and I think he put out some apples. And this. I'm not saying this to, like, make fun of him because the first time hunter, you have no idea. He obviously did something better than I have ever done. Right. I've never seen anything that big. And this deer just comes walking in with a doe. He's getting ready to shoot the doe and he sees the buck. He's like, ah, I'd rather want a buck. So he shoots this buck. Anyways, the thing got officially scored at 225 and like 1/8th or something. [00:32:37] Speaker A: That is awesome. [00:32:37] Speaker B: Just a massive crazy deer. Oh my. [00:32:41] Speaker C: That's incredible. [00:32:42] Speaker B: I still keep in contact with him. [00:32:44] Speaker A: And that is crazy. [00:32:48] Speaker B: That was a cool one. He was excited, but his buddies showed up too. And you could tell the buddies were pretty jealous, like, because they hunted. And he's like, yeah, this is pretty sweet. And I'm like, dude, give my house away for this deer. [00:32:59] Speaker A: Can you imagine, though, starting off that big? I wonder if he's going to like hunting in the future. Because I had a friend that very similar, wasn't nearly that big of a buck, but shot a big buck his first time going out or. Or one of the first times. But he never really went hunting after that. [00:33:19] Speaker B: So this guy actually, he shot a buck this year. Again, obviously not a 225incher. It was. It was a nice, decent ear Width buck. So I think he's, he's enjoying it. [00:33:28] Speaker A: Okay. [00:33:29] Speaker B: But I always, I always said I'm glad I didn't shoot a big buck to start with because it feels like that's still like a goal of mine. Right. I got to try to get bigger. [00:33:36] Speaker A: And bigger and bigger. Yeah, that would be tough to beat. I mean, to try to beat that, he probably won't ever. [00:33:42] Speaker B: Like, that was one of the biggest deer shot in Ohio that year. Like, what do you. [00:33:48] Speaker A: Yeah, that is crazy. [00:33:49] Speaker B: Place, right? Time. [00:33:50] Speaker A: Yeah. Yep. So you got into spray drones as well, was that. We had talked about police. Was it originally. Because you were talking to me about spray drones, were you originally thinking of taking it to Belize or was it build a business here and then go down there? [00:34:07] Speaker B: So originally my plan was kind of to do Belize thing. I wanted to buy a drone, get it started down there, train people and kind of manage it from a distance. And I kind of figured out, you know, that might not be the best idea, especially not being experienced in the space. So then I ended up actually starting my own business here in hopes that it could be successful enough that I could in the off season travel down, which is still a dream of mine that I want to make happen. [00:34:32] Speaker A: And when it's winter here, is it summer there? [00:34:34] Speaker B: It's just warm and hot all year. You don't have to look at the weather. It's close. [00:34:39] Speaker C: It's close enough to the equator. It's. It's the same thing all. All day, every day. Maybe. Maybe a variation of what, 10 or 15 degrees? [00:34:46] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:34:46] Speaker A: And. [00:34:47] Speaker C: And it rains more at one point and a little bit less at the other. Yeah. [00:34:51] Speaker A: Okay, so it's not like going to New Zealand where it's like different. [00:34:55] Speaker B: Yeah. One crop comes off, they're tilling for the next crop. They're just, they're going. And it's a very. So they have caliche, which is like a clay. And if it rains on that stuff, you're not getting equipment in there. So the plains have a huge monopoly down there to spray. So they have like a community farming community. And those planes are just non stop going every day, every day. Like. Well, if they're going every day, that means there's a lot of spraying. [00:35:18] Speaker A: Yeah, so. So there are. I mean, they are paying to have aerial application done. [00:35:23] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:35:24] Speaker A: Just not with drones yet. [00:35:25] Speaker B: So there's one guy who has some T30s down there, but he just does his own farm. He doesn't really do it for other people. And obviously T30 isn't quite as efficient. He's had a little bit of issues, but he's, he's been pretty successful with his own farming stuff down there. But it's just, I mean you have your beans, you have your corn, you have your coconuts, you have your citrus fruit. Like there's a lot of opportunity there for different stuff to spray all, all year long. [00:35:51] Speaker A: You got an in. Like if I were you, I'd be down there trying to figure that out right now. Because if you, if you can be one of the first ones that tries to make it big, it's gonna go like just, just even operating costs. Obviously you know that now starting your own up here. But operating costs. I don't know how the airplanes are going to compete with you down there. Is it mountainous? [00:36:14] Speaker B: In certain areas, but no, where they farm. It's all flat? [00:36:16] Speaker A: Oh yeah. [00:36:17] Speaker B: Like pretty much completely flat. Beautiful fields. [00:36:19] Speaker C: Is there a, a large Mennonite or Hutterite community down there in police? [00:36:24] Speaker B: Yeah, so there's a Russian Mennonite community. Russian Mennonite that kind of. They, they own a lot of the bigger businesses in the like. So my father in law actually owns the only dealership that deals in John Deere parts. So they're connected with farmers already. Like it just seems, it's screaming for me to do it. I just need to do it right. And I've tried to convince them to. [00:36:43] Speaker A: Like, maybe you just need to take me down there and we do it with each other. [00:36:47] Speaker B: That sounds like fun. [00:36:49] Speaker A: Holy Mac. [00:36:50] Speaker C: Summer weather sounds good right now. [00:36:52] Speaker B: Let's go. [00:36:53] Speaker A: Yeah, but there's definitely. So there's money there, right? They're buying tractors and stuff. [00:36:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:36:58] Speaker A: So that wouldn't be the hurdle. I wonder what the it is. [00:37:01] Speaker B: You, you can't make near as much as you do here. But also like, like your, what you have to pay workers and all that stuff is. It's a lot lower cost too. And then you don't have competition. Now you know how it is. The same as here where we're at. Somebody makes money doing something. Everybody wants to jump into it. But I think if you would show the farmers that it works. I see no reason. Like I know people that have ground rigs down there and they're going nonstop. [00:37:26] Speaker A: Wow. [00:37:27] Speaker C: What kind of crops are we talking about here? What, what, what? [00:37:29] Speaker A: He just, he just named them off. [00:37:31] Speaker B: Corns, bean, sugar cane, coconut, citrus, Quite a variety of different stuff. So it seems like there's always something to spray with all the different, different crops. [00:37:41] Speaker A: Dude, I'm thinking of like, are there Restrictions maybe on flying big drones. [00:37:46] Speaker B: So there is. But nobody follows them. It's. It's a small enough country. They can't really regulate anything. And it's on the. It's a third world country, so it's on the corrupt side for a lot of it. So there's. Technically, you're not supposed to fly a drone in Belize unless it's for a business. And you have to like, go through all these hoops and I don't know one person who does that. And there's never been anything done. That's part of the reason I've been hesitant. [00:38:11] Speaker A: Okay. [00:38:12] Speaker B: Probably should contact someone in the government and see what the stipulations are. [00:38:17] Speaker A: Sometimes it's easier to ask for forgiveness than it is. [00:38:19] Speaker B: Well, I don't think they would care, honestly. [00:38:21] Speaker A: Yeah. For sure. If you're helping the farmers. [00:38:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:24] Speaker A: Yeah. Holy moly. Yeah. Sounds like an opportunity. Well, the cat might be out of the bag, so you might want to get a. I don't know how many. [00:38:32] Speaker B: People from Belize are listening, but no. [00:38:35] Speaker A: People from the states. [00:38:37] Speaker B: Oh. [00:38:37] Speaker A: They're like, well, I'll just go down there. But you got the connections, dude. Yeah. So how'd your sprayed business do here in Ohio? Because this was the first season, right? [00:38:47] Speaker B: Yeah. So I had a little bit of issue with my licensing stuff. [00:38:51] Speaker A: I gave you some wrong. I gave you some wrong information because there was a lot of. One person would tell you one thing. One AI tell you one thing. So we'll just clear the air right now. If you are a resident of Ohio, you cannot get your Kentucky applicator's license and expect it to reciprocate in Ohio. If you're a resident of Ohio. Yeah. Now if you're in Kentucky and you have it down there, then it will reciprocate into Ohio. [00:39:14] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:39:15] Speaker A: Because in the beginning when I started, I was given that information because Kentucky, it's easier to schedule your testing with Kentucky, the state of Kentucky. You can do it online. Where? Ohio. You had to go somewhere. I don't know if it's still like that. [00:39:29] Speaker B: Yeah. You still have. I think once you have your license, you can like do the renewal or whatever they call it online. [00:39:35] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:39:36] Speaker B: But for the original first time, you have to go in, which isn't a big deal. It's. Yeah, I thought it would be harder than it was. [00:39:43] Speaker A: But the test, to pass it. [00:39:45] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:45] Speaker A: Okay. Did you go to the class, like the eight hour class thing? [00:39:49] Speaker B: No, I just went for the test. [00:39:50] Speaker A: Wow. So what did you use to study? [00:39:52] Speaker B: I just. They have online. [00:39:54] Speaker A: Okay, so you just did the online study. Yeah, because. So go ahead. [00:39:58] Speaker B: I was just going to say I passed the Kentucky one, which wasn't valid. So I had already done. It's pretty much the same thing. So it wasn't new. [00:40:04] Speaker A: But hey, now you could go to Kentucky if you wanted to. [00:40:07] Speaker B: True. [00:40:07] Speaker A: Yeah. Kentucky acres down there can be really nice if you get in the right area. [00:40:11] Speaker B: That's what Madison was saying. You guys, you know, did a lot quickly down there. [00:40:14] Speaker A: Dude. Big fields. Big fields. So Ohio, you just studied online and then went and did the test. Pass it the first time? [00:40:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:40:22] Speaker A: Aerial and core. I, I, I'm going to come out and say it. I did not pass my aerial. I, I thought I was a little too, what is that called? Not cocky. But some people say confident. Confident. Yep. That's it. Yeah, I was a little too confident and didn't read out the question properly. [00:40:40] Speaker B: Because they're with the trick ones. [00:40:41] Speaker A: Yeah, the trick ones. Yep. They did, they get, they got me with the trick ones. So I went back a couple weeks later and passed that. So your part 137, did you have somebody help you with that process? [00:40:51] Speaker B: I did, yeah. [00:40:52] Speaker A: Okay. [00:40:52] Speaker B: Which, that's where there was some mix up. So the end number wasn't correctly registered because they didn't, they lost the, the invoice. You have to send the invoice for the drone. They lost it. So they gave me an N number and then when I went to use the end number, it said the number was invalid. Anyways, it was a big mix up and I didn't get to spray until halfway through the season or end of the season. So I only ended up doing a couple thousand acres. [00:41:15] Speaker A: Okay, was that acres that you lined up or was that other applicators in the area that ask you for help? [00:41:23] Speaker B: So originally a guy, my buddy Jay from Maverick Jones, he'd reached out that he has a little more than he can do because he has another business he works on. And through that I ended up getting partnered with a co op towards the end of the year. So this season should be really good. [00:41:37] Speaker A: Nice. [00:41:38] Speaker B: They have a lot of work to do. [00:41:39] Speaker A: Is that in your area or do you have to drive out of your area where you live currently? [00:41:43] Speaker B: It's a lot of driving. I mean, I have local farmers, it's picking up locally. But I do drive a lot of times they try to find, you know, 500 acres, whatever, in the same location. And then I'll drive maybe, maybe two, three hours and bust it out and then drive back Home. [00:41:58] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:41:58] Speaker B: There was long days and small miserable fields. [00:42:01] Speaker A: Are you flying one drone or two drones? [00:42:03] Speaker B: Just one drone right now. [00:42:04] Speaker A: T50. [00:42:04] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:42:05] Speaker A: So have you seen the T100? [00:42:08] Speaker B: I've seen them. I haven't flown. [00:42:09] Speaker A: Do you think that's something that you would upgrade to? [00:42:12] Speaker B: Possibly. If I can get bigger, nicer fields, for sure. [00:42:14] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:42:15] Speaker B: What I'm struggling with as I'm getting these small, ugly fields and stuff where I don't know how much it would help, but if I, you know, grow. Definitely if I upgrade. [00:42:25] Speaker A: Yeah. And you're running it off of a trailer or off of a pickup truck? [00:42:29] Speaker B: Off a trailer. I designed my own trailer and it was based off of your trailer. It doesn't look near as nice. [00:42:34] Speaker A: Yeah. You were budgeting, you were trying to keep it under a certain price. [00:42:37] Speaker B: I was trying to get into everything debt free. So I wanted to. I knew if I did that I wasn't pressured to just, yeah, you know, lose everything or whatever. So I tried doing that and that's why it's been a little slower. I'm not having the best stuff. But as you know, after your first year of spraying, you have tons of ideas for the next season. You want to do things differently. So I'm very excited. I think it'll go, go great. [00:42:58] Speaker A: Sweet. That is good to hear. What was the biggest challenge of starting a spray drum business? [00:43:03] Speaker B: Probably regulations. [00:43:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:43:05] Speaker B: Honestly, it was confusing. Takes time. Your insurance and stuff. Once, once that was figured out, I mean, you need to know what you're doing. But the drones are so streamlined and the programs and stuff you use that it was, it wasn't that hard. If I can figure it out, anyone can figure it out. [00:43:21] Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah, I would, I would say that was the biggest thing. When I started a spray drone business, like I, I started finding out I was trying to do it all on my own. Like all the licensing, the end numbers and how to file and you can't do it online. You got to send paperwork in. It was like getting to the point where it's like, screw this. Like, this is not worth it. Like, that's literally how it felt because it was that much. But now, you know, there's companies out there. I'm gonna new ag we help you guys with that process. It's like because of how complicated it can be, is making it easy. That was the, that that was the biggest goal, is trying to make it easy for guys like yourself that are coming in. You know, it's a, an easy all in one type of thing. You can get Your regulations. You can get your end numbers, you can get your drones, your training, the whole nine yards. Did you buy your drone from us? [00:44:15] Speaker B: I did, yeah. [00:44:15] Speaker A: You did? [00:44:15] Speaker B: Yep. [00:44:16] Speaker A: And the regulations. Did you do it to somebody else? [00:44:19] Speaker B: I did, yeah. [00:44:19] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. I did mine originally with somebody else, and I did not like how that went because the communication was not that great. [00:44:31] Speaker B: That was my experience. Exactly. And they gave me wrong information. That's why it took so long. It took me about. It was just over a year to get a lot of my stuff. And partially it was because they messed it up. So I would highly advise get someone who knows what they're doing that's reputable, and get it done right. Trying to do it cheap didn't end well for me because I lost a lot on a lot of work I could have been doing. Sitting at home, twiddling my thumbs. [00:44:54] Speaker A: Oh, no. Shoot. Do you think you'll get into, like, the food plot thing? Like, people talk about that, right? Like, getting into that niche type of market spraying. [00:45:05] Speaker B: I've done a little bit of it. I feel like you have to have a different setup to be efficient. You don't have to, but a lot of those food plots are back in. You know, you can't drive your whole rig back to him very easily. I think you'd want, like, a rig to put on your truck, like, better your truck, so you can drive back and get into places, maybe have a UTV or something, and maybe even a smaller drone. I don't know. I mean, T50 is fine. I don't know if I'd use a bigger drone than that. But the problem is a lot of people don't want to pay what it would cost to come out and do a little acreage. But the ones I have done have been big acreage, you know, with big food plots, and they've turned out really very well. [00:45:42] Speaker A: Nice. [00:45:42] Speaker B: A lot of COVID Cover crops. [00:45:44] Speaker A: It was huge for plots. Yeah. [00:45:45] Speaker C: We. [00:45:46] Speaker A: We did quite a bit of COVID crop, usually over corn. They wanted something green when they picked the corn off of there. So what's. What's a goal a year yourself with or for your company in. In the spray drone side of it? [00:46:00] Speaker B: I guess my goal is just to see how this season goes. I want to grind. Like, I just. I don't know. I'm just hungry. I just want to go all day, all night and try to grow, get a second drone, which I might. Might even do before the. For the season starts. Just in case I was running one drone, didn't have a crash didn't have anything had changed. I think it changed three props that had cracks in them. That was the only thing that went wrong. So I might, might add another drone to the fleet. And then hoping by the end of this next season and about this time next year, I might be in bliss. I don't know. [00:46:32] Speaker A: Wait, so do you do it all by yourself or do you have a helper that I do. [00:46:37] Speaker B: Yep. I, I had a helper for some of it, but a lot of the fields that I was doing were pretty small, moving a lot that it wasn't. It didn't create efficiency like I thought it would. So I've just been by myself, driving all over. [00:46:50] Speaker A: Did you do any door knocking to try to gain work or. [00:46:54] Speaker B: I did. Farmers, as you know, are very reluctant for. To trust someone with their crops is a huge deal. I found out a lot of it has been people I know. And then you do service for them, they're happy. Word of mouth is key. And through the co op, obviously, if someone can get connected with a co op, that's huge. Cause then you have the co op I'm connected with. I'll show up. They give me a map, send me the files of the fields, even load me up with chemical, fill me up with water and I go out and do the work. [00:47:24] Speaker A: That's nice. [00:47:25] Speaker B: It's a lot easier than. [00:47:26] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:47:26] Speaker B: Dealing with individual farmers, especially in our area because we have a lot of small farmers. Like you won't really find a lot of farmers that have 2, 3, 400 acres of no cropland. You're dealing with a 50 acre field, 100 acre fields. Pretty big. [00:47:39] Speaker A: Yeah. I just had a guy from Illinois come in, get some T1 hundreds and he was saying that their average farmer is a thousand acre farmer here. I think the average farmer might be a hundred, maybe and a quarter. I don't know. [00:47:53] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:47:54] Speaker A: But it's small compared to some of these people. So yeah, dealing with those types of fields can be very challenging to, to be productive. Right. If we're charging only by the acre, yeah. [00:48:04] Speaker B: It's great for the farmers. Right. It does a good job. Gets in where planes can't and stuff. But to try to get a lot of acreage done in a day when you're setting up a lot and moving. [00:48:12] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:48:13] Speaker B: It's a little more difficult and you have to charge accordingly. [00:48:16] Speaker A: Yeah. So somebody helped you make a connection with that co op. I was trying to go out door, knock on co ops and show them my equipment. Have you been able to pick up any work that they just randomly seen your rig and they called you like that? [00:48:30] Speaker B: Yeah, I have. All the time. Farmers are stopping in. Hey, what are you doing? You know you want to do my field just over the hill I'll do. You know, I have 50 acres and sometimes I'll just drive over and do it right away if I have the time, obviously. But yeah, that's, that's been a big thing. People stopping in, asking questions. [00:48:46] Speaker A: Sweet. Mostly fungicide work. Did you do any burn, burn down or herbicide work? [00:48:51] Speaker B: Little bit of herbicide and beans and stuff. [00:48:54] Speaker A: Okay. [00:48:54] Speaker B: Mostly fungicide. [00:48:56] Speaker A: Okay. And then did you do any pasture laying? [00:48:58] Speaker B: I did a couple. Not a huge amount, no. [00:49:01] Speaker A: Okay. Any words of wisdom to somebody that would want to start in this business? Because obviously, as you know, this is a growing thing and people are going to do it. [00:49:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:49:13] Speaker A: What am I going to preface by you not sharing? They're still going to try to find it elsewhere. Because when I was first doing drone new recovery, I would not even want to share what drone I was using because I didn't want other people doing it. Then I figured out that's not going to work. They're going to figure it out one way or the other. [00:49:27] Speaker B: Well, that, that's the thermal side of things. I was kind of like, people call me regularly every couple weeks. Some will come, hey, should I get into this? And I'm like, sure, I'll be honest with them, but don't do it as a side gig and think you're going to get rich off of it. And I mean like, this has to be passion and get into it. Then yes, you can make a go of it. You gotta be driven. It's. It's a blast. Flying drones, but it's, there's more to it than people think. It's a job. You gotta, you gotta work hard at. [00:49:50] Speaker A: It and yeah, you gotta want to be the best at whatever you're gonna do. Like, even if you're not going to be the absolute elite, you gotta want to try to be that. Because if you don't, then they're gonna find somebody else that will. [00:50:05] Speaker B: Yeah, I get a lot of calls from farmers like, hey, this guy said he was gonna come, didn't show up, or he says he can't do it to that, or he didn't want to come out that late and look for my deer. Like, yeah, and then I'll go do it and well, that's. Yeah, work taken away from them. So got to be driven. Yeah, just do it. [00:50:22] Speaker A: That's. [00:50:22] Speaker B: Now's the Time. [00:50:23] Speaker A: Yeah. Before we go, cost of deer recovery, is it. Are you still the same to do a deer recovery when you first started, or did you have to adjust your price some with the competition? [00:50:34] Speaker B: I have been struggling with price, to be honest. I do local for cheaper, and then if I have to drive a distance, it goes up. I've stayed pretty much the same. The one thing I find really interesting is the people who have super cheap prices are the people struggling to get jobs. There's a reason that they're having to lower their prices. They're either not doing a good job or something's going wrong. [00:50:55] Speaker A: So when I start seeing the $100 to $150, I start getting a little concerned. [00:51:01] Speaker B: I did too. And you know just as well as I do how many people get a loan out on a drone to start their business? [00:51:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:51:08] Speaker B: And then they call me like, hey, how many have you done? Oh, I've done three. [00:51:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:51:13] Speaker B: And then they see their drone for sale on Facebook Marketplace. It's just they're not driven enough. They think they can buy a drone and it'll just make their phone money. [00:51:20] Speaker A: Ringing off the hook. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely not that. [00:51:24] Speaker B: As you seen. I haven't had problem getting work this year, and there's more people than there ever has. I think it's just, I don't know, you got to work hard at it. I mean, there's no cheat code. [00:51:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:51:33] Speaker B: Especially not in our area. It's pretty saturated. I mean, you can get. I know a guy in southern Ohio, actually met while I was doing spray work down there, and he bought a thermal drone. And I don't know where he's at at recoveries, but I think he did 80 some his first year. But he's the only guy around. There's nobody else to call. He has the monopoly on it. And people. [00:51:52] Speaker A: Yeah, that's usually the, the question I ask them. They ask me a question, hey, should I get into this? And then I, I basically, it's a question to them, well, what's the hunting like in your area? Like, if you expect to have this business be successful and you got to drive two hours to get to a good hunting area. I don't know if you're going to want to do that, but yeah, you gotta have. You gotta be in an area where there's hunters, don't expect it to be successful, where there's not about a bunch of hunters. But I am pretty impressed with where you're located and how, how many calls you get in the area you're Doing your recoveries. So it must have just started with a few people, and then they spread it out from there. But there's guys out there now, though, too, right? [00:52:38] Speaker B: Yeah, there is. I run across quite a few people, but I also, I try to contact the people, become friends with them. I know there's, there's a situation. I don't know if you've been watching Northeast Ohio. There's a situation right now with two drone companies. Big issues with each other. Anyways, be friends with everyone. Help them out. That's better than tearing people down. The people tearing other people down are the people struggling with their own business because they're afraid of somebody doing it better. If you do the best job, people are going to call you. It doesn't matter how many people around. They're going to get the person they trust. [00:53:08] Speaker A: So there's some drama going on between companies that are in the same area and they're having issues. Do you know anything about it, Landon? [00:53:16] Speaker B: I don't want to get into one of them is my friend, and I don't want to be biased, but. [00:53:20] Speaker A: No, no, I, I, I would say I probably don't have time to, to know what's up. [00:53:25] Speaker B: Well, a lot of, A lot of the drama side of things is in the pets on the pet side. [00:53:29] Speaker A: Oh. [00:53:29] Speaker B: Because people get emotional and there's lost pets, and that's where you get into the more interesting. [00:53:35] Speaker A: Speaking about pets, didn't you do a ton of that, too, Like. [00:53:39] Speaker B: I did quite a bit, yeah. I haven't kept track, numbers wise. Honestly, I kind of just take them as. [00:53:43] Speaker C: So the pet number is different than, than the, the deer recoveries that earlier. [00:53:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:53:49] Speaker A: So that's separate. Okay. Wow. [00:53:50] Speaker C: Nice. [00:53:52] Speaker A: Do the pets pay better? [00:53:54] Speaker B: No, honestly, not really. You're dealing a lot more with city people, and they're just. As much as they want to find their dog, a lot of people just don't have the money. I know people are setting that out where you can do payments and stuff. I haven't done that. [00:54:06] Speaker A: Payment plans? [00:54:08] Speaker B: Yeah. Payment plans for pet recoveries is huge right now. [00:54:10] Speaker C: Yeah. So you, you're dealing with a client that is more emotionally attached to and you don't know the behavior of the animal that they've lost. So it's, it's more challenging in a more challenging urban environment, and someone in that is more emotionally invested than most deer hunters that you're going to be dealing with. So it's a, it's a tough grind. Plus, you're saying that they don't have as have the money often to be. [00:54:37] Speaker B: Able to pay some customers. You find more customers that. That want a cheaper price and stuff. But yeah, high emotions. And it's also like, I have one funny story real quick is I was looking for a cat, right? And they're crying their cat's missing, right? I'm looking for this cat. I searched for like four or five hours for this cat in a city, right? I looked at probably, I don't know, 30, 40 cats, can't find this cat, right? They're like, distraught. I go home feeling like an idiot, can't find their cat. They call me the next day, hey, we found our cat. Guess where it was. [00:55:10] Speaker A: Like, I don't know. [00:55:11] Speaker B: This was up in Lorraine. It was in Kentucky at a truck stop and had it chipped. So they know it was the same cat. How it got there, I don't know. Obviously probably jumped in a truck or somebody picked it up. But that's why I couldn't find the cat. It was in a different state. Oh, my God. [00:55:24] Speaker C: You're five hours in. [00:55:26] Speaker B: How much? Yeah, drone battery. Didn't want to go that far. So you run into a lot of unknowns with pet stuff. Like people picking up the dog and you're looking for it. It's not even out there anymore. Or the dog is six miles away already. Like, it's. [00:55:40] Speaker A: Yeah, just something I didn't get into. I. I did some pets early in drone deer and made some videos on it, but it was just not a passion of mine, like to. To stand there and fly. I like flying, but I can't say that I like flying. [00:55:56] Speaker B: Looking for pets, it's very high emotions. Like, when you find them, it's. It's amazing feeling, right. People are high five and hugging, crying, like, you just saved an animal's life. Right. But then when you don't, you go home, you know, they're sad, they're disappointed. It's very high highs and very low lows. [00:56:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:56:13] Speaker B: Then when you go to deer side, it's like, oh, this is easy. This deer's huge. I can't miss them. [00:56:17] Speaker A: Yeah. Huh. You could do pet recoveries up until a certain time in the summer, but trying to find a pet in a thick canopy is almost impossible. [00:56:28] Speaker B: I'm transparent with people. I tell them, hey, not a good chance if he's in the woods, that I'll find him, but I can come try. And a lot of people are like, sure, if there's a chance, I want you to come. Well, I've gotten. I wouldn't say. Good. I've gotten very lucky sometimes where you're a miniature poodle in the middle of a cornfield. Like. Yes. Found them. [00:56:49] Speaker A: That is cool. Doggone, huh? Any other cool things you'd want to share? Actually, how do people get a hold of you? [00:56:56] Speaker B: I have a Facebook page. Cams drone service. My phone number's on there. They can message me, text me, call me if you. [00:57:01] Speaker A: So you Do. You do go by Cam. So when I was saying Cam, That's. That's okay. [00:57:05] Speaker B: Yeah, that's. That's my business name, so it better be. [00:57:07] Speaker A: Yeah, but Cam's drone service on Facebook. Do you post regularly? [00:57:11] Speaker B: I've been slacking. I'm trying to post more. I'm. I've honestly been so busy this season, it's hard for me to. [00:57:17] Speaker A: That is so. [00:57:18] Speaker B: You know how it is with so much footage and photos and stuff. I get. I get behind on things, but that is trying to be more active. [00:57:24] Speaker A: Here's a question, actually now, I just thought about it. People have been getting scammed by taking prepayment. You don't do any of that? [00:57:34] Speaker B: No, prepayment. [00:57:35] Speaker A: Okay. [00:57:36] Speaker B: And it's unfortunate. I've been halfway to do searches. Nope. We found them. Or dog came back and stuff. And then it's. I mean some people offer to pay a little bit for gas. That's just part of it. Turn around and go back home. But no, I don't. I highly advise if people are gonna hire a thermal drone person to do the research. There's a lot of scams, just like anything nowadays. [00:57:56] Speaker A: Yeah, a lot of scams. It's mind blowing to think that this scam wasn't a thing until thermal drones became good enough and drone deer recovery got the views. Literally. Scam artists came up with the new. And like you're saying the emotions on the pet, it's way worse than pets. Like people getting scammed in pets. [00:58:16] Speaker B: I did one where actually I felt so bad for the lady. She got a loan, paid twelve hundred dollars for this so called expert thermal drone guy to come out. Never showed up. It was a scam. She called me crying and I was like, I just didn't have the heart to like charge her. So we went out and didn't find the dog. The first time they called back, there was a sighting three miles away. Came back and ended up finding the dog. [00:58:37] Speaker A: Oh, you go. [00:58:38] Speaker B: So it was. [00:58:39] Speaker A: Holy moly. [00:58:40] Speaker B: But it's. Yeah. I can't believe. [00:58:41] Speaker A: Screw you can't. The scam guys. That's. [00:58:45] Speaker C: That's an incredible Amount of money. But that also speaks to the amount of attachment that these owners have to their pets. So it can be very rewarding. And you're, you know, high, high, low, lows. [00:58:56] Speaker A: But that's why the scam artist figured. [00:58:57] Speaker C: That'S why it works, right? [00:58:59] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. [00:59:00] Speaker B: They get them all work to, hey, I'll for sure. I'll for sure find your dog. Like, just pay me and I'll find it for you. And they're like, well, sure, I want to find my dog. Here's the money. [00:59:07] Speaker A: Oh, my. [00:59:08] Speaker B: Then gone. [00:59:08] Speaker A: Well, I'm glad you found it for him. Holy moly. I never had that happen. But, yeah, then didn't do many recoveries for pets. Just wasn't my cup of tea. [00:59:18] Speaker B: But you have to be into pets big time. It's high, high. [00:59:21] Speaker A: Do you have pets? [00:59:23] Speaker B: I don't right now. [00:59:24] Speaker A: So why are you into it? [00:59:26] Speaker B: Honestly, it's kind of an opportunity thing. Kind of happened by accident. Somebody called me, and I got into it, and now they know I do it and their neighbor loses one. I do a lot more local than driving far distance. I have friends in other parts of Ohio that I'll give them to, but if I have time, I definitely do pets. [00:59:41] Speaker A: How. How many hours you got on your thermal drone? [00:59:45] Speaker B: I was just thinking about that on the way here. I have not checked recently. I don't know. [00:59:49] Speaker A: Do you still have your original drone? [00:59:50] Speaker B: I do, yes. Oh, I have. [00:59:53] Speaker A: So you never flew it into a tree? [00:59:54] Speaker B: Two props on the thing is the only thing I've done, and that was because my hand. Don't stick your hand into a prop. In case anybody's wondering. It doesn't feel good. [01:00:03] Speaker A: Wait, you're not one of those guys? We talk about those guys. [01:00:06] Speaker B: Yeah, I know you weren't trying to change the battery out. I found the deer, though. That's the most important thing. Okay. No, we found a deer, and we were in a CRP field, and I tried to land it. [01:00:15] Speaker A: There's no way you tried catching a matrix 30T. [01:00:18] Speaker B: And I forgot to turn off the obstacle sensing, and the thing freaked out and whacked. Yeah, there's blood everywhere. I could see the bone in my thumb. [01:00:27] Speaker A: I could. [01:00:28] Speaker B: And I flew the drone back to the truck with no props on the. On the top. Like, there was, like, that much props sticking out the one side, and the thing flew back to the truck. Fine. I didn't notice it till I landed. [01:00:37] Speaker C: Because your hand decimated the props. [01:00:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:00:39] Speaker A: Oh, my God. [01:00:41] Speaker B: You could blood trail me. That's an embarrassing One, but. Oh, I never did it again. [01:00:46] Speaker A: I did not know that. Yeah, that is crazy. [01:00:50] Speaker C: Did you take a photo? [01:00:51] Speaker B: I think I have a photo somewhere. Yeah. [01:00:54] Speaker C: We might not put it on the, on the podcast, but I want to see it. [01:00:58] Speaker B: Did you have to go get one more parking lot? Doing surgery on myself? No, I banged it up and it healed really good. Actually. This is mostly like flesh. Like you could see the bone right here on my knuckle. But it didn't really do any long. [01:01:11] Speaker C: Term damage to the guy. [01:01:12] Speaker B: Yeah, worked out a little sore still, but jeez. [01:01:16] Speaker A: I, I, I had a guy send me a picture. He tried swapping the battery while I was flying. Oh, if you look at that, that doesn't even work. Like it's gonna hit the propeller. [01:01:27] Speaker B: I don't feel quite as dumb, but that's still pretty dumb. At least it wasn't a. [01:01:31] Speaker A: So yours, yours hit you because you were trying to land it at a C in a CRP field. [01:01:38] Speaker B: Yeah, I went to reach for it and it sensed my hand and I was trying to do it quick and it, you know, like turned to kind of go to get away from my hand because obstacle sensing and yeah. Tilted a little bit and got. [01:01:49] Speaker C: Yeah. Then the prop angle changed and got you. [01:01:52] Speaker B: Wait. Yep. [01:01:52] Speaker A: But you don't catch your drone regularly. Not a third. [01:01:55] Speaker B: Not anymore. Did you and have before? [01:01:58] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I just don't have what it takes. [01:02:01] Speaker B: Well, I don't like, I don't do it ever if I don't have to. But there's no place to land it. Right. The CRP field where you're going to land. I should have flown it back to the truck, but I was trying to be cool and get a photo with me and the deer because it's a big bug, like 170 inch buck. Right. But yeah, sure. Wouldn't suggest it. [01:02:17] Speaker A: Definitely do not do that. [01:02:18] Speaker B: They're not toys. [01:02:19] Speaker A: They're not the 30T that sucker. The thing's heavy. [01:02:23] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:23] Speaker A: It's probably pushing 8 pounds or over with the two batteries in it. And those props are spinning fast. Now the smaller ones like the Matrice 4 and yeah, that's a little different. [01:02:34] Speaker B: But I was thinking like my mini, you know, grabbing all the time. What's the big deal? Yeah, not the same. [01:02:39] Speaker A: I just don't think even if you would grab it, you try to flip it like you do the other one to get it to shut the motors. I don't know. [01:02:45] Speaker B: Too much power probably to really. [01:02:46] Speaker A: Yep. I think there's too much power. [01:02:48] Speaker B: I would always just land it and have it shut down in my hand. [01:02:51] Speaker A: Okay, so you keep pulling, stick down and. Yeah. Yep. Wow. You are daring, though. Good for you. [01:02:57] Speaker B: Dumb, I think, is the word you're looking for. [01:03:02] Speaker A: That's cool. All right, well, I don't have anything else. Thanks for being on. [01:03:07] Speaker B: Thanks for having me. [01:03:08] Speaker A: Alrighty. See you guys on the next one.