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On Halloween weekend in 1986, 17-year-old Noel Dalluge traveled to a remote hunting cabin in Aitkin County, Minnesota, with a group of high school friends. The boys were looking forward to a weekend of hunting, partying, and celebrating the end of their football season.

But by the next morning, Noel had vanished into the woods. He would never be seen again.

What began as a search for a missing teenager quickly became one of Minnesota's most perplexing disappearance cases. Hundreds of volunteers, law enforcement officers, and National Guard personnel scoured the surrounding forests, but despite the massive effort, searchers found no trace of Noel. No clothing. No hunting gear. No evidence of what might have happened to him.

As investigators questioned the friends who had accompanied Noel to the cabin, troubling details began to emerge. The boys had been drinking and partying the night before, and their accounts of the weekend raised questions that would persist for decades. Years later, new allegations and suspicious statements cast doubt on whether Noel had simply gotten lost—or whether something far more sinister had happened.

Nearly 40 years after Noel disappeared, his family is still searching for answers. In this episode of Blood Trails, host Jordan Sillars speaks with Noel's brother, friends who were at the cabin that weekend, and others who have spent decades trying to piece together what happened. Their accounts reveal a tangled story of teenage secrets, lingering suspicions, and a family that refuses to give up hope.

Did Noel become lost in the vast Minnesota wilderness? Was he the victim of a tragic accident? Or does someone who was at that cabin know exactly what happened to him?

Nearly four decades later, the mystery remains unsolved.

Click here to listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.

Got a tip about this case or know about another you think we should cover? Send us an email at [email protected].

October is moving fast, and conditions are changing across whitetail country. This week, Kaitlyn Maus checks in from the Midwest as she prepares to head to Wisconsin, Aaron Hepler brings us the latest from Pennsylvania, and Dan Tutor reports from the big woods of Maine. We break down what each hunter is seeing right now - from current deer movement and fresh sign to food sources, weather, and how October patterns are beginning to shift. With three very different regions represented, we get a boots-on-the-ground look at how whitetails are behaving as we move another week closer to the heart of the season. Tune in for fresh, in-season whitetail intel and a look at what’s happening in the woods right now.

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This week on the show I'm joined by Andrew Moore, author of the new book Beasts of the East, to discuss the fall and rise of some of the eastern United States' most charismatic wildlife and the lessons we can take into the future.

Thanks to our sponsor, Conservation First Bank.

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Janis Putelis guest hosts MeatEater Trivia with Spencer Neuharth, Brody Henderson, Mark Kenyon, Randall Williams, Laura Mascari, and Matt Miller.

Presented by Busch Light

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Host Clay Newcomb welcomes author and host of MeatEater’s Gunfighters podcast, Bryan Burrough, alongside Jacob Meyers and Andrew Maxwell of The Southern Outdoorsman Podcast. Bryan talks about some of the history behind the legends of the American frontier and explore how much of what we think we know about Old West gunfighters comes from Hollywood rather than historical fact. From Wild Bill Hickok and John Wesley Hardin to Billy the Kid, Wyatt Earp, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the conversation separates historical reality from popular mythology. Along the way, the crew discusses dueling, frontier justice, the cultural cost of backing down from a fight, and why disputes over seemingly trivial matters could turn deadly.

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Whenever we drank coffee at breakfast or beer at dinner, my late friend Tom Heberlein and I liked discussing how and where hunters preferred to die.

Such talk at Old Tamarack—Heberlein's hunting shack near Mellen, Wisconsin—was usually light-hearted. As Professor Heberlein knew too well, death isn’t something you order from menus or schedule on calendars. By the time I became an Old T regular 25 years ago, he had long before buried his father and all the camp’s founders, friends, family, and other originals.

Heberlein especially liked stories about hunters visiting their father, uncle, or friend on their deathbeds and requesting they send a big buck past them next deer season. He wondered why that was such a common bedside wish. Nothing he knew about Judeo-Christian beliefs suggests God grants the newly dead power over Earth’s creatures. And yet many hunters ask that favor during final visits with loved ones.

Then again, maybe they’re just making small talk to convey love and affection they otherwise struggle to share. It’s easier than speaking from the heart, especially when others might eavesdrop.

Heberlein knew one thing for certain, though: He did not want to die while hunting, especially from a heart attack, whether from excitement or while dragging a buck to camp. “Who’d want to die that way?” he’d ask skeptically. “Heart attacks hurt! And they aren’t always quick! And it would ruin everyone else’s hunt!”

Then he’d clutch his chest in mock agony, buckle his knees, and belt out his best death rattle.

Honoring that theme, Heberlein sent me an email on March 6, 2019, after reading an obituary in the newspaper “Dagens Nyheter” in Stockholm, Sweden, where he lived much of the year. The obit told of a well-liked and respected 44-year-old man who worked hard helping vulnerable youths. The man had established a successful residential-care home and worked for the Swedish National Board of Institutional Care.

Heberlein respected all that, but that’s not why he sent the man’s obituary and translated its highlights. He liked the obit’s conclusion and knew it would make me smile, too:

“On November 11 last year his heart suddenly stopped during an otherwise successful hunt with his friends.”

And then Heberlein asked the question every hunter would ask: “What was he hunting?”

The obit never specified. I’d guess the poor guy’s “otherwise successful hunt” involved a deer species, either a moose, roe deer, fallow deer, or red deer.

After all, when we read about hunting-related deaths, it usually involves deer, and it’s usually more from heart attacks or treestand falls than accidental shootings. Sometimes it’s even someone you know, such as my late friend Tom Tilkens, who died Nov. 8, 2017, at age 72 when dragging out a buck he arrowed while crossbow hunting in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.

Plus, research in 1996 by Heberlein and his friend/colleague Rich Stedman found that deer hunters, more so than bird hunters, suffer more dramatically from “buck fever.” This instant and often convulsive adrenaline surge strikes hunters when they spot a deer and anticipate a shot.

Heberlein and Stedman weren’t just speculating from barstools at the Drop Tine Bar & Grill in Cayuga, just down the Conley Road from Old T. They had data proving it. They had hooked heart monitors on 10 hunters to measure their responses during 56 hunts for ducks, deer, geese, and upland birds (ruffed grouse and woodcock).

Their study found that deer hunters’ heart rates jumped an average of 33 beats per minute higher after spotting and shooting a deer. In contrast, heart rates jumped 28 beats for goose hunters, 22 for duck hunters, and 10 for upland-bird hunters.

But Heberlein and Stedman also conceded theirs wasn’t a huge sample size, and they explained how responses can vary by a hunter’s age, fitness, and experience. Wildlife managers, for instance, tend to be less excitable than their fellow hunters when spotting deer, waterfowl, or upland birds, given their training, fieldwork, and professional detachment.

Further, hunting has infinite variables. Duck hunters, for instance, regularly out-sweat the average deer hunter. Waterfowlers often must work hard to hurriedly set decoys before first light, especially if they’re slogging through soft muck and knee-high waters in heavy, clumsy chest waders.

The late Don L. Johnson, a longtime Milwaukee Sentinel outdoors writer, once told me a story about a duck-season opener he covered in the 1960s. Johnson said he was hanging out at a boat launch, interviewing hunters as they returned from nearby sloughs and marshes, probably along the Mississippi or lower Chippewa rivers. As each boat approached, Johnson took photos and helped tie their boats to the pier before retrieving his notebook and asking about their hunts.

After helping one crew tie off their duck boat and skiff, he was stunned when one of them said something like, "We had a great day, except Charlie died while we were setting up. We almost quit and brought him back, but then we talked about it. We agreed Charlie would have wanted us to stay and hunt. Either way, he wasn’t going anywhere. We’re glad we stayed. The ducks were really flying!”

What?! Johnson looked again at their boats but didn’t see a body.

Two of the hunters rolled back one of their hand-tied wire-grass blinds. There lay ol’ Charlie in the bottom of the boat among some decoys, his cased shotgun tucked beside him.

Heberlein loved that story when I shared it years ago during an Old T visit. Unfortunately, I never thought to ask Johnson if he had written about it for the Sentinel, and Don’s been gone since January 2006.

But I did think about all this a few weeks ago after clicking on an email from Heberlein’s wife, Betty. Her note included photos of Heberlein’s gravesite 200 yards south of his shack. The photos showed a newly engraved headstone, a flat-faced chunk of red granite that Old T’s caretaker, Al Conley, pulled from a nearby trail.

I hope Heberlein is pleased with his modest gravesite atop a knoll on Old T’s back 40. A heart attack didn’t put him there, and the site offers pretty views of each sunrise over the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. Plus, visitors can watch while standing at attention, or relaxing on a Leopold bench Heberlein provided.

Just realize, of course, that Heberlein shoulders no obligation to send a big buck past any visitor, whether you’re there to hunt, cut firewood, or seek his silent counsel.

Heberlein cared most about hunting ruffed grouse. Woodcock and waterfowl, too. He never fancied himself a deer hunter, and it’s too late to start now.

If I had to make a list of the most addicting type of game animals, pheasants would land near the top. There’s just something endlessly fun about hiking through hip-high brush with a shotgun as pheasants suddenly explode into the sky. It’s an old-world type of hunting that makes you think of aristocratic gentlemen decked out in tweed, crisp mornings, pointing and pouncing dogs, and the echoing call of “rooster!” reverberating through the autumn air.

The only real problem with pheasant hunting is that it often feels like you can’t get on birds until cold weather and winter’s snow flatten out brush and get the birds moving. Finding roosters in the early season can feel like trying to find a needle in the proverbial haystack, or in this case, an entire hay field. But there are certain methods to early-season pheasant hunting that can help you get a limit of birds as soon as opening morning. You just need to know where to look.

Most pheasant hunters find success by busting through the brush like a giant kaiju plowing through the center of Tokyo. They stomp through brush, kick at bushes, and motor through the grass in an attempt to get roosters into the air as quickly as possible. While this may be an effective strategy later in the season when pressured birds are hiding in the thickest cover, you’ll have more luck taking it slow.

I’ve always approached early-season pheasant hunting like I’m still-hunting for whitetails. With the birds holding tight to small patches of cover in relatively open areas, going too fast can cause them to flush well outside of shotgun range. So instead of marching across a field like it owes me money, I meticulously pick my way through the brush and grass like a teenager trying to sneak out of the house without waking my parents.

As you approach potential pheasant cover, look over your intended route carefully and plan your steps. Then, pick your feet up as high as you can, take slow, heel-to-toe steps that allow you to feel the ground and avoid stepping on any sticks or dried leaves that will alert roosters to your presence.

If you’re hunting with a dog, try to keep it as close to you as possible and really slow down and try to get eyes on any birds it points out before making your approach. While hunting this way may be a bit frustrating, if you’re patient and pick your way along, your persistence will be rewarded with more shots at close birds.

While the natural pheasant hunter instinct is to plunge headlong into the thickest cover, you’ll usually have better luck sticking to the edges of crop fields in the early season. During the early season, pheasants are very rarely in the thick stuff. Rather, the birds will be transitioning from late summer brood cover, which consists of thicker grasses and weeds, into more open areas where they can feed heavily. This makes the fringes of crop fields great areas to find early-season birds.

Whether it’s a standing field of corn, wheat, sorghum, or sunflowers, or even the stubble of an already harvested area, these areas will draw pheasants. The birds will flock to them in the early morning to feed heavily before hunkering down in nearby grasses or brush to roost. Hunting the fringes of these crop fields can be incredibly productive, as you’ll often flush birds that are heading into or out of the fields.

When you’re hunting the edges of crop fields, concentrate your efforts on brush lines where different crop fields intersect or on patches of grass with any flowering plants on the edges of the field. These are ideal areas for roosters with a bellyful of corn or wheat to settle down to digest. Often, they’ll hold tight to this cover until you’re practically on top of them, so make sure you and/or your dog cover every inch of the spot before moving on.

Another great area to find birds around the fringes of crop fields are tree rows between fields, especially pines or hardwoods that haven’t dropped their leaves yet. These areas provide excellent overhead cover for pheasants, as they can feel safe from predators beneath the canopy of branches and leaves. It should be noted that pheasants in these areas can be extremely jumpy and will likely flush early, so make sure to have your gun right on your shoulder as you approach.

I remember going pheasant hunting with a couple buddies a few years ago, where we spent the entire morning hunting a spot that was chock-full of pheasants without seeing a bird. It was a hot day, and we decided to head down to a shady creek to water the dogs before heading back to the truck. That’s when the brush exploded, and it seemed like every pheasant on the property was hanging out next to the creek. That experience taught me something—pheasants like water.

Whether it’s a creek, pond, or even a nearby lake, pushing the brush around water can be extremely effective on hot days, especially in the late morning or early afternoon. Not only do these areas provide an easy spot for roosters to rehydrate, but they are also generally cooler and provide a lot of cover where overheated pheasants can roost and rest before evening. On warmer days, look for areas along the edges of waterways with a lot of swale grass, standing brush and bushes, or even dense clumps of timber. You’ll likely find a bird or two.

When hunting cover around water, it’s important that you get right into the thick of it. Pheasants hiding in these spots generally lock themselves down and hold tight until you’re practically stepping on them. Push right into the heart of the cover along the water, even if it means getting your feet wet, and then keep your gun up and ready.

Focus your attention on any small gaps in the brush or overhead canopy where pheasants have an easy escape route.

Early-season pheasant hunting may look and feel a lot different than the hunt you planned in your head. Generally, the days are a lot warmer, and the birds are a lot harder to find. But when done right, it can create some of your best days in the field with piles of unpressured birds flushing right into your gunsights.

Join best-selling author Bryan Burrough as he drills deep into the legend of John Wesley Hardin, the teenaged Texas psychopath who may have been the Old West’s deadliest gunfighter.

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Most hunters love to sit over scrapes, but they often have their timing wrong. Whitetail science tells us that two to three weeks before peak breeding is the time to hunt scrapes, which means for a lot of hunters, they need to be in the woods right now.

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I was 20 feet up a tree on a picture-perfect October morning, watching my favorite oak flat. It was overcast, and the weatherman was predicting rain in the afternoon. I expected the deer to be up and moving ahead of the front, possibly moving between the neighbor’s cornfield and the trees dropping acorns on my flat.

Just after sunrise, I heard a combine start up from the property next door. I sat for another 45 minutes until the rumbling sounded like it was coming from my back pocket, climbed down, and called it a day.

Back at the truck, I could see the combine cutting through the corn, blowing up dust that billowed across the field to settle in a thick layer over my windshield. My carefully planned October morning had turned into an entirely different hunt, and I hadn’t done a darn thing wrong. That’s the reality of hunting in ag country. Your plans can change as fast as the farmers’ do, and you’ll need to adapt, just like the deer will.

It’s easy to think about a field of corn, soybeans, peanuts, or other agricultural crops as a food source for whitetails, but they offer more than something to eat. They also provide cover and security. When that crop suddenly disappears, so does much of the cover, and the change can have an immediate impact on how deer move across the property.

A buck that might have felt comfortable crossing a field of standing corn during daylight hours may feel too exposed to make the same trip after the field is harvested. Even familiar field edges can turn into wide-open runways once the combine comes through.

But that doesn’t mean the deer have abandoned ship. Just because the field has been harvested doesn’t mean the food source is gone. Combines are efficient machines, but they aren’t perfect. Depending on the crop and how it was harvested, there could still be plenty of groceries sitting in that field. It can make for a pretty attractive dinner table, especially right after the combine comes through.

The problem is getting a deer to walk up to the table during legal shooting light. You might see plenty of tracks and sign along the field edge but never see a deer in the field during daylight. The deer may still be using the field like a highway. They're just waiting until you can't see them.

Deer are understandably reluctant to step out into an open field during daylight. But they still know good food is out there, waiting for them. Instead of hunting the field, hunt where deer hang back in cover, waiting for darkness to fall before making a move toward the food. You probably have a better chance of getting a daylight shot there than in the field itself.

Staging areas can be subtle. If you can tell where the deer are entering the field, either with well-worn trails or trail camera evidence, start by working your way backward from there. Look for bends in the field edges, corners hidden from the road, and trails that dump into the field. Pay attention to fresh tracks, droppings, and browse that show deer are spending time in the area, not just rushing through it. The goal is to find places where deer can stand in cover and assess danger before stepping into a wide-open field.

If you have trail cameras, pay attention to the timestamps. A camera can tell you that deer are using a field entrance, but the timestamps can tell you when they're using it. If most of your photos show deer entering the field after dark, try moving the camera back into the cover to see where they're staging before sunset. Those photos can help you narrow down where to hang your stand and whether deer are moving through during legal shooting light.

Be careful not to charge into potential staging areas. Deer use them because they feel secure, and you don’t want to blow that with carelessness. Think about wind direction and access routes, and plan your entrance and exit strategies accordingly.

Once the crop is cut, you just have to reassess the property to see where the deer’s priorities have shifted. Dropping acorns, weedy edges around a cutover, browse along a creek bottom, or pockets of soft mast fruit are all potential deer magnets. It’s not that the field stopped being a food source; the deer just may have other options that feel more secure during daylight.

Look for fresh sign around those areas, and pay attention to how they connect to bedding cover. Trail cameras can show you if the deer have shifted their grocery runs to a new location. If their activity shifts to an oak flat or a brushy edge, that may be a better place to spend your time than watching an empty field.

That’s what happened on my oak flat. It took less than 12 hours for the does and yearlings to flood the oak flat, which is less than 400 yards from the cornfield. It took a little longer for the bucks to move in, but I had several show up on my trail cameras 36 hours later. The combine hadn’t chased the deer off the property. It just changed where they wanted to be.

Finding where the deer are moving during daylight after the combine comes through is only half the battle. You still have to be able to hunt those spots without blowing them up. Before setting up on an oak flat, a high-traffic trail, or a staging area, think about how your scent is going to travel.

A picture-perfect spot is easily ruined if the wind carries your scent across it. Set up so the wind carries your scent away from where deer are likely to be, and if the wind doesn’t play right, choose a different location.

If you’re hunting areas with any kind of elevation, you’ll also have to consider thermals and the time of day. As a general rule, thermals tend to drop in the evening toward sunset and rise in the morning as the sun does. Of course, there’s always an exception depending on the terrain, wind speed, and canopy cover. Just make sure you assess the wind before and during your setup.

Don’t forget access and egress. A route that was hidden when the corn was still standing could leave you totally exposed after the harvest. Avoid crossing fresh trails or traipsing through bedding cover to get to your stand.

That combine didn’t ruin my October when it rumbled to life in the cornfield that morning. It just ruined the plan I had before it showed up to cut the field.

That’s one of the realities of hunting ag country. The property you scouted in September won’t be the property you hunt in October. It only takes the purr of a diesel engine to redraw the map. When that happens, don’t stubbornly keep hunting the property you remember. Instead, hunt the property you have in front of you.