Raining down good luck

“Oh no!” I shouted in my mind. “This couldn’t have just happened!” There I stood in a jumble of hardwoods and fir gripping the wet, wooden stock to my 6.5 Swedish Mauser. I just ejected the last brass from the magazine as I painfully watched the largest blacktail buck I’ve ever shot at dashing down the ridge through the viney maple.

Ever since I moved to the Northwest a few years back, I’ve wanted to kill a big blacktail buck. In the past few years, I’ve gained a great respect for these brush-loving deer and their elusive habits. I hunger for more and more blacktail info that could help me become a better hunter. Fortunately, I have good friends (and even better blacktail hunters) who have taken time to answer my copious blacktail questions. Boyd Iverson’s book titled “Blacktail Strategies II” has been my bedtime bible for the past 6 months. I have read it cover to cover 4 times.

This fall I invited several friends to join me for the last week of the general season Oregon blacktail hunt. Both of these guys have never hunted blacktail. The rifle season is over a month long so I had plenty of time to hunt before my friends were to arrive. In the past few years of blacktail hunting, I’ve learned blacktails are not sun-bathers. The first three weeks were blue-sky and dry conditions making for some tough hunting. I hunted nearly every morning and overall saw very few deer. Emily and I both hunted and could have taken a few smaller bucks that we caught in the open at first light before they’d enter the timber to bed until the following night. As the last week arrived, I was elated to see lots of rain in the forecast. Rain and early November mornings are a good recipe for harvesting a big blacktail buck. The stars were beginning to align…

Chad and Jared showed up and so did the rain. I asked them if they had their essentials before we towed my trailer into the mighty Cascade Mountains. “Knife, tag, rifle, bullets, toiler paper, and rain gear. I’m ready to roll” Jared responded. I was relieved to hear they brought rain gear. In this country you don’t head into the woods during wet weather without a complete set of raingear from head to toe. I strongly suggested to both Chad and Jared more than once before the hunt to invest in some solid rainwear. Two minutes of walking in Oregon’s wet foliage without raingear will weaken your hunting zeal like nothing else, take my word for it.

After three weeks of hunting in dry conditions I couldn’t have been more excited to see rain showers. Chad and Jared, on the other hand, probably weren’t so happy about all the rain. Both of them, like me, grew up in Utah which happens to be one of the driest states in the nation. I’m sure they were thinking I’ve lived in this wet stuff too long and moss has entered my brain inhibited clear-thinking. I don’t think they quite understood my obsession for rain and blacktails.

None of us have ever hunted this area although I know of its reputation for big deer. Jared and Chad decided they would spend the first morning driving around looking at the country in the daylight before stepping off-road. I walked into the thick stuff blindly right from camp. After a hundred yards of tip-toeing through heavy brush, I wondered how I would even see a deer if it was 30 yards in front of me. I noticed a small old logging road just downhill of me, so I dropped down and crept along the old road. The soft rain pitter-pattered atop the large maple leaves overhead helping mask my occasional clumsy footstep. I rounded a corner to see a large grass opening surrounded by oak. A nice three-point buck stood on the other side of the meadow. He had somehow sensed me and was cautiously waiting for my next move. I considered dropping to my stomach and taking a prone shot, but this was 15 minutes into the first morning at camp. His white double-throat patches were as white as a bleached t-shirt and his neck was swollen. We watched each other for a few minutes. Subconsciously, I guess I already knew I wasn’t going to shoot this buck, but the trophy hunter in me hadn’t convinced the sustenance hunter in me quite yet. I laid the crosshairs on the buck’s shoulder and practiced on overcoming my bad case of buck fever. I was relieved to see the buck bound off because the sustenance hunter in me is persuasive and almost made me pull the trigger.

I continued on my morning hike enjoying every little bit of it. I had seen some really fresh bear tracks, plenty of squirrels, some mountain quail, and a ruffed grouse. I spotted another small herd of deer moving quickly up ahead. I broke off of the old logging road and began following deer trails. I wasn’t in any hurry for I had no schedule, no phone calls to tend to. I had the day to just be me. An hour or so had passed and I had arrived at the edge of a small canyon. The canyon bottom had a little creek and some thick viney maple. I’ve learned bucks like thick brush, especially viney maple. I stopped for a few minutes and listened to my surroundings. I heard a familiar noise a couple hundred yards down the canyon. My heart began pounding as I recognized the sound to be antlers clashing! I slowly crept closer unable to see anything through the heavy foliage. Buck fever kicked in and my legs were like rubber and my heart was working double-duty.

I stalked up to the edge of a small ridge overlooking the little canyon in front of me. The sparring was 150 yards in front of me but I couldn’t see a thing with all the underbrush! Several minutes passed by while I waited patiently. What happened next will forever be etched in my mind. I dreamed of something this extraordinary to happen to me for a long time. 30 yards below me, I saw a flash of grey. I peeked around the large fir I was rested against to see a heavy buck looking right at me. The buck had patiently waited for me to walk away as he hid in his bed 30 yards below me. I guess I had stuck around long enough to make him nervous enough to stand up. I tried to lay the crosshairs on his back when I noticed another buck a few yards to his right. I knew immediately it was a buck I had dreamed about. Even with scope covers keeping rain off of my scope lens, my scope was fogged up and hard to see through. I placed the crosshairs behind the shoulder and squeezed the trigger. The buck laid his head down low to escape. I missed! I shot again, and again, and again. I knew my second shot had hit him but was uncertain on my last two shots. He was on a full run through some heavy cover.

So there I stood with my dad’s first rifle (he killed his first and biggest muley with the same rifle) in hand, no ammunition, and a buck that just bounded down the canyon. Years ago, while on a mule deer hunt in Northern Utah, you’d think I would have learned my lesson to bring sufficient ammunition, even on small hikes. One morning, I emptied my magazine at a small two-point buck across a deep canyon. Seconds after I shot my last round and the disappointment of missing set in, I then became really disappointed. A heavy, deep-tined 5x4 snuck within 10 yards from my side eluding some hunters doing a drive up-canyon. I watched the buck creep out of my life and I cried; back to my story.

I looked like an Olympic hurdler running back to camp to get more bullets. In no time, I was back and ready to follow where I had last seen the buck. I had crept a hundred yards or so and I began to think I might have just messed up on a great buck. I glanced to my left and spotted his beautiful orange-colored antlers. I knew it was him. His head was erect and he looked like he was ready to bolt. I took a deep breath and squeezed the trigger one last time. I couldn’t be anymore excited about this buck.

To kill my biggest blacktail with a rifle that carries so much sentimental value to me truly made for one great hunt. Jared and Chad both did very well not allowing the moisture dampen their mood. Chad had to leave camp a bit early and never got to fill his tag. Jared, on the other hand, was able to get into the timber and get charged by a bear and kill his first blacktail buck. Thanks Jared and Chad for coming down and entertaining me for a few days.