Professional baseball player. Commercial insurance salesman. Guide. Farmer. Entrepreneur. Outfitter. Duck Hunter. Business owner. Husband. Father.
At some point in his life, Tony Vandemore has held all of these positions and more. Many of these he still holds today- most importantly to him are the last two on that list.
More than likely you already know a lot about this man. He is after all a world renowned waterfowler, and you’d likely give up a leg or two to trade places with the guy. Tony’s approach to his business and its success is not entirely unique in its kind, though certainly one of the most if not the most successful. Farming for ducks takes A LOT of work year in year out, especially when you’re working with well over 10,000 acres. You didn’t think that watching his guests crumple greenheads dropping from the heavens into a timber-lined mallard hole happens by accident or just good luck did you? When the majority of your hunts are with clients who have rebooked you know you’re doing it right. But success isn’t a stopping point for Mr. Vandemore- it’s a motivating factor. It drives him to keep working hard and learning more, in effort to continuing the development of one of the best waterfowl outfits the world has seen.
I had the opportunity to speak with Tony for an hour while he was on his way to a meeting regarding his new Lodge and outfitting location at The Grand, a new location where the Habitat Flats crew will be hosting clients along the Missouri river just a half hour from the Home Lodge. Let me tell you something- hopping on the phone with a guy you’ve been following for the better part of a decade and have a great respect for, well it can make you a little nervous. Tony however is as humble as can be and gives thanks to his partners, guide crew, lodge employees, family, clients and God. A conversation with a man like that makes your nerves go away real quick, and the next thing you know you feel like you’re just talking to another good ol’ boy who just lives for the sound of whistling wings and the report of a 12 gauge aimed at a feet down green-headed mallard duck. Thanks for the conversation, Tony.
-Corey Mulhair @SPLITREED
[Photos property of Tony Vandemore and Habitat Flats]
SR: What was life like before Habitat Flats?
Tony: I played baseball for a couple of years in the minors and figured out I wasn’t very good at that. I met a guy when I went to school (Truman State) in Kirksville, MO who owned an insurance company and we got to be good friends. I became a commercial insurance agent and I was commission only so I would work hard all spring and summer and come duck season I could hunt ‘til noon and go into the office and take care of things. I also ran a Snow Goose hunting outfit on my own through word of mouth before Habitat Flats.
SR: How did Habitat Flats come to be? Tell us about the ‘all-in’ moment.
Tony: I was still living in Kirksville for the first four years of Habitat Flats, still an insurance agent, but basically I would take off the entire Fall and Spring to run Habitat Flats. It was hard to manage time-wise but at the time I was single and didn’t have any kids so I was able to make it work. It got to be so much work about four years into it that we needed somebody here full time. Luckily I love to do it, thats my passion. I like the off-season management, the farming aspect of it. Even before Habitat Flats we had leases and areas that we were managing.
SR: What does your year look like, starting at the end of Spring Snow goose season?
Tony: After season I start laying out my management plan for the year. What I want to do with each farm, what I want to try different, things I want to do with those farms to make them better. Right after Snow Goose season we’re kinda putting the wheels in motion- getting tractors and planters ready and hopefully by mid-to-end of April we’re able to get into the fields and start getting some work done. From there, planting season can last a month or it can last two months- it just kinda depends on the weather. We start moist soil draw-downs in June a lot of the time, after the crops are in. Those wetlands are a serious amount of work, trying to control invasive species, trying to get it dried out so you can disc and do certain things that you want to do to promote natural vegetation and plant things you want like Japanese Millet and other duck food. Really the off-season is my busiest time of the year. Duck season is a vacation compared to the off-season. Theres also always the day to day stuff when you’re running a business. Bills, meetings, payroll and all that stuff. Doesn’t seem like there’s enough hours in the day a lot of the time. Duck season runs into dark geese in January, February then snow goose season rolls back around.
SR: Your wife does a lot of work for the business as well?
Tony: Oh yeah it works out great because she’s able to work from home and be with the kids. We collaborate a lot on of the marketing things, she’s got an MBA from Loyola and marketing is what she does it works out well. She’s a HUGE help.
SR: Tell us about ‘The Glory Days’ video coming in July.
Tony: It’s a cool deal it’s gonna be a mini-series based on our guides at Habitat Flats and what they do. Most people just see a picture with a bunch of mallards or even the guests who come and see the great habitat, and think it’s like this all the time. Not a lot of people see the work that goes on behind the scenes to make sure we have good habitat and hunting. We’re lucky. We’ve got awesome guys that work for us. They’re all my best friends. We’ve got great ladies that work at the lodges. We’ve just got a fantastic team and we wanted to let everybody see what they do, they work so hard to make Habitat Flats a success.
SR: It takes a lot of passion and a huge amount of work to be successful in this business the way you are, and to keep growing, where does that drive come from?
Tony: The four of us that started Habitat Flats are all very driven people. We love hunting, we love the conservation part of it and we just basically took a huge risk and we were able to talk to bank into giving us a big loan. My drive from the business standpoint and working it just comes from within. I can’t sit still. Being able to do what I love to do everyday makes it not feel like work. If you love what you do you’ll never work a day in your life. Theres a lot of truth to that but theres a lot of days where it is a lot of work, I just I’m not built to sit behind a desk or be inside and when we started Habitat Flats I thought about ducks every day of the year. Now I’m blessed with the opportunity to work on duck stuff all year long. Our season never ends now and that’s great.
The conservation part is something I’ve always loved. My uncle worked for the state of Illinois for the DNR and took care of a couple refuges and did a lot of habitat management stuff and he taught me a lot. It’s just what I’ve known my whole life. Even so when I was in high school you’d play football on Friday nights and you hunted Saturday and Sunday. All we did growing up was hunt and fish throughout the year. I’ve grown up in the outdoors and I’m just blessed to be out here everyday now.
To be self-employed, you know not everybody can be self-employed. Nobody pushes me harder than myself and thats a key to being self-employed you gotta be able to push yourself. If somethings gotta get done the only place you can point a finger is back at yourself.
SR: How does waterfowling make you a better person?
Tony: I think for one it makes you really appreciate what God’s given us and what our Military fights for everyday- our right to be and to do what we want to do. Nature is just absolutely beautiful and being out there everyday I certainly still don’t take it for granted. There’s nothing like watching the world wake up in a duck blind. Listening to the excitement, the sounds, watching the sun, my dog and a hot cup of coffee. Waterfowling is everything. Everyday is different it’s a chess game. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter how many birds you kill it’s always fun.
SR: Theres not a lot of people that get to see what we get to see.
Tony: No there’s not and we’re blessed. For people that don’t hunt, I can’t imagine that they wouldn’t enjoy it if they got to see it sometime. Being able to do it a lot, as a hunter we all go through different phases. What waterfowling has done for me as a hunter.. You know when you first start out all you want to do is pull the trigger I mean you just wanna shoot. Then you want a kill, then you want to get your limit, and then you kinda evolve and you want to get your limit but they’ve gotta be right. Once you’ve done it long enough you kinda reset that point. It becomes all about the experience.
The most anti-climactic part of the day is actually pulling the trigger. It’s about setting up the decoys, looking forward to it, looking at the weather, talking to your buddies. It’s just something that makes you feel alive. Doesn’t matter if you pull the trigger or not the experience is gonna be great.
SR: Where do you see waterfowl hunting in 30 years?
Tony: You know, I really hope it’s where we’re at now or even better. I always heard stories about back in my grandfather or great-grandfathers day when the skies would be black with ducks and we had a pretty rough stretch back in the 80’s and whatnot but the glory days are now. We’ve got more opportunities now than we’ve ever had. Early teal season, early Canada goose season, we’ve got Spring snow goose season now. If you wanted to and were able to travel you can hunt August to May. I just pray that in 30 years all those opportunities are still there. It’s gonna take obviously continued wet years up on the prairies where the breeding happens and that’s the number one factor. But it’s also gonna take a lot of conservation up there and across the flyways to sustain a healthy population of birds. 30 years from now I pray to God that my girls are able to do what I do everyday, if they want to enjoy that experience. Not necessarily my girls but other peoples kids- I want my grandkids to be able to enjoy hunting and all the things I love about it. We want to make sure it’s around forever, we want to make sure it doesn’t get shut down or anything happen to our guns. There’s gonna be a lot of things to fight along the way and they’re things worth fighting for. Hopefully it’ll be like it is now, in 30 years. Ultimately we have to stick together as hunters, we want our heritage to stick around.
SR: Social Media and Hunting?
Tony: It’s a double edged sword, we now have the ability to be in front of a lot of people both hunters and non-hunters. I think we all have a responsibility to portray our heritage in a positive light. We can post certain things that make hunting look terrible, but we can also post things in a very tasteful way that make hunting look like the amazing thing that it is. And you know, social media is good because hunters can get together and talk with other hunters in various parts of the country and world and trade trips, do different things and meet new people. I think everybody needs to realize they need to take responsibility, we need to take note that we’re not the only ones looking at these things. Anti-hunters are, but we’ll probably never change their minds. Non-hunters too, people who aren’t for or against hunting they just don’t know much about it- those are people that we can influence in a positive way for our industry.
SR: Is there something you think every waterfowler should experience once?
Tony: Every waterfowl hunter at some point should step out of what they’re used to and see something different. There’s so many unbelievable things in the waterfowl world- I mean being under a big tornado of snow geese coming in, or watching mallards drop through the tree-tops, being in a big tornado of lesser Canada geese. Shooting sea ducks out of a raft in the middle of the ocean. Theres so many cool things out there and it’s easy to get complacent and do the things that you’ve always done. Man theres a lot of cool stuff out there to see.
SR: You can only hunt one more time- what are you doing?
Tony: If I had one day left to hunt it’d be greenheads and sunshine in flooded timber. With that being said it is so hard to chose. I’m blessed to live in Missouri and be able to do different things.
SR: Do you get to hunt solo or with small groups of buddies or family much?
Tony: I wouldn’t say I do it a lot. We have 80-85% re-booking at Habitat Flats and a lot of these guys have been hunting with us 5,6,7,8 or 9 years. Our guests are great friends we talk all year long. Really when I’m out there I’m guiding but I’m hunting with friends. There’s days where you know the hunting is gonna be phenomenal and when the guests finish up in the morning, some of us guides might go out and have a buddy hunt in the afternoon to go out and get our ducks. We still get to fun hunt quite a bit.
SR: Do you have a dream hunt, something you haven’t yet done?
Tony: I’ve been fortunate to do a lot on the waterfowl side. I absolutely love Spring Turkey hunting. Been lucky to travel around and kill turkeys in several states. Probably one dream hunt would be an elk hunt in the mountains when they’re bugling. For me it’s a tough time of the year to get away, but some day I’m gonna do it.
SR: Do you have a favorite way to cook or prepare waterfowl?
Tony: Ooh weee, theres a lotta good ways. One of my favorite ways is to take the breasts and cut ‘em into thin strips and then soak em in olive oil. Get a couple skillets hot and in one of them sautee peppers, onion, mushrooms. The other one sear those duck strips to medium rare and put em on a hoagie (with our buddies home made dressing) and some cheese. Philly mallard steak. Man they’re delicious.
SR: What is something a guest might do to not get invited back?
Tony: Gun safety in general. We have a little talk every morning in the blinds before the day gets started. If you get a second chance with a firearm you’re darn lucky.
SR: What’s it like to run a lineage- Ruff, then Ki, and now the new pup Ki’s son?
Tony: It wasn’t something I thought about prior to Ruff, but I like certain things in dogs. I like ‘em a little smaller in size. My males are about 65lbs. The biggest thing I like is that off-switch. When they’re at home I never have to put them in the kennel, they’ll sleep on the back patio- not barking not wound up. Then when you get them out in the blind they’re all business, but it’s still a contained energy. You don’t know they’re there until they’re needed. After I got Ruff I was like, man, I’ve got to keep this going. And Ki is the same way. It’s just neat to have that heritage, that lineage to look back on and it’s a good way to always have them with you. A dog’s only fault is that they don’t live long enough.
SR: With the rain you’ve had to deal with this year are you changing any plans or just waiting it out?
Tony: It’s been pretty devastating. Levee’s are broken and it’s flooding again in some areas. It’s happening all over the midwest and we’re just waiting now and patching some things up. When I laid out plans at the end of duck season for all these farms, things I wanted to accomplish, you know you got plans A, B, C and so on- and now I’m off the alphabet. It’s been pretty crazy. When you’re dealing with mother nature you can’t control her you gotta roll with it and make the best of whatever hand you’re dealt.
SR: Moist soil management for habitat and duck feed?
Tony: Natural moist soil brings natural millet and smartweed, in some areas we’ll plant Japanese millet and hopefully buckwheat if it gets dry. You know, you transition to what you can do. I like to put a big emphasis on bugs and invertebrates and I think people tend to overlook that. Especially the first few weeks of the season when it’s still warm, our ducks are packed full of bugs and invertebrate. You’re gonna get better bugs and invertebrate blooms when you’re putting water on at warmer times of the year. Horizontal cover, if you go in and mow it, knock it down with a brush hog you’ve got all that fodder that lays on the ground- it’s really good for bugs and invertebrates. It pays off for us. We’re pumping water early- late August into September because we get good teal hunting for one, and two we’re promoting those bugs and invertebrates and it really pays off the first part of regular season.
SR: Managing those wetlands and moist soil areas do you feel you’re bringing ducks back year after year because of the habitat and feed you provide?
Tony: Yeah absolutely. Not only because they know that early season diet is available but people don’t realize how early some of these birds are migrating. When we’re pumping that early water we’re stopping some of those early migrators, when they get settled in it’s easier to stop some of those birds behind them. They stop and find theres good food like millet and smartweed and invertebrates and it’s easier to keep them around then.
SR: What are you looking forward to the most about the new lodge ‘The Grand’?
Tony: It’s more of an extension of the original lodge but it’s right next to the Missouri river, which never freezes. We just don’t get the winters like we used to. We don’t get the snow cover like we used to and they don’t get pushed as far South. I’m just looking forward to the views from the lodge on the bluff and be able to see 100’s of thousands of ducks and snows and everything. I love that part as much as the hunting and looking forward to the view of The Grand more than anything.
SR: How much money would it take for you to throw all your bands in the ocean?
Tony: Haha, it probably wouldn’t take that much. I like the bands that I’ve got and really the ones I’ve got on my lanyard are old ones. It’s more about the thought of the people I’ve been with when I’ve been fortunate enough to kill em. My grandpa, my uncle, my dad, all my buddies- it’s more of that thought that I like than actually having the bands. I enjoy seeing bands like everybody else but anymore I don’t really care if I get one or don’t get one. The ones from the pre-Habitat Flat ones are pretty special to me. I get more enjoyment now from seeing somebody get one than if I shoot one myself.
Probably one of the coolest things I’ve seen ‘band-wise’, we’ve got a guy who hunted snows with us a long time from Las Vegas. He brought his high school son with us on one trip, they hunt a lot but never killed a band. People can be band-crazy you know, well he was laying next to me and killed a banded blue goose that you can’t even see a number on it it’s so old. I mean it is unbelievable. The oldest band I’ve ever seen by far. He was excited, first band he ever killed and it was ancient. They got packed up and ready to leave after the trip and he walked up to me and said, “open up your hand’“.
He put that band in my hand and said, “nobody is gonna appreciate this where I come from, I want you to mount that bird and put it in the Lodge so everybody can see it”. I was just floored. A kids first band and he thought enough about it that people weren’t gonna appreciate it and he wanted to leave it in the Lodge.
